


Upon This Beaten Brow, I Bless

by Bythoseburningembers



Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, BAMF Stephanie Brown, Barbara Gordon is Oracle, Batman is a traumatized little boy because I said so, Brother-Sister Relationships, Brotherly Love, Bruce Wayne is a Good Parent, Bruce doesn't do emotions, Cas is a badass, Clark Kent & Bruce Wayne Friendship, Damian Wayne is a Little Shit, Diana doesn't understand men, Dick Grayson Needs a Hug, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Family Feels, Jason Todd Has Issues, Jason Todd Needs A Hug, M/M, Minor Barbara Gordon/Dick Grayson, Non-Linear Narrative, Protective Bruce Wayne, Rich kids have all the fun, So Clark is So Done With These People, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, Tim Drake is Red Robin, Tim Drake is So Done, Violence, this wasn't supposed to be this long
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-08
Updated: 2020-06-12
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:41:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 14
Words: 29,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21976750
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bythoseburningembers/pseuds/Bythoseburningembers
Summary: Multiple-Earth assassins begin stalking and capturing members of the Bat-Family. Surrounded by delusions and ghosts, can the Bat-clan defeat this newest enemy before it drives them all insane?
Relationships: Barbara Gordon/Dick Grayson, Batfamily Members & Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent & Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson & Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson & Damian Wayne, Dick Grayson & Jason Todd
Comments: 19
Kudos: 145





	1. Ground Zero: April 14th

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is an experiment. I read a book that did not follow a linear timeline and decided to try it because it was a fuckin awesome book. Still, this one revolves around the date Dick went missing, April 14th, but it will hop back and forth between the present, past and future. I promise it will make sense!

_April 14 th, 6:35PM_

Bruce’s skin had started to tingle even before Tim came back. 

At first, he had assumed it was merely the blackening bruise along his left collarbone, or perhaps the two days he had gone without more than an hour of sleep each. As Clark might have said, he was already a paranoid bastard on his best days, so at his worst?

Apparently, he was… What had Clark called him? Ah, yes. Bat shit crazy.

It had been corroborated by several trusted sources, including his children. However, Bruce knew from experience that he wouldn’t have survived this long without instincts quick and sharp enough to cut.

He also knew Tim. His third son.

So, when the young man (when had he gotten so _tall?)_ stopped just at the edge of the living room, hands jammed into his pockets, eyes obscured by strands of thick black hair, Bruce halted mid-step. His skin tingled, a hard pit forming in his gut because he had sent Tim out to get his brother.

Tim was alone.

The background suddenly sounded fuzzy, Jason’s quips and Damian’s groans of irritation nothing but static. Alfred’s contented sighs as he and Stephanie tried to scold them into doing more than just rearranging the cups faded. Even the harsh roll of Barbara’s wheelchair against the hard-mahogany floors of the dining room vanished. He felt eyes on his back; and knew that Cas had noticed his unease.

Doubtless she would have stopped, stared at his back, but Bruce didn’t hear much else. Tim noticed him too. He looked up, and deep disquiet, hidden behind a mask of Robin-stoicism, made Bruce shudder.

He set the breadbasket on the table; stepped forward. He steered Tim into the adjacent hallway by the shoulder, the sounds of the other room suddenly snapping back into focus.

“Give it back, Todd!” Damian fairly shrieked.

“Why don’t you grow taller, blood son?” Jason taunted.

“Boys,” Steph, Babs, and Alfred all sighed in unison. “Where is Dick? We need mediation here!” Steph continued.

Tim’s frown deepened at that statement. “Tell me,” Bruce murmured. “What’s wrong?”

Tim shifted on his feet. “When’s the last time you heard from Dick?” he asked softly. Bruce’s mind swept past the last few weeks. It wasn’t uncommon for him to fall out of communication with his eldest. Between their respective roles both in and out of heroism, it didn’t leave much room for long conversations. Mainly, he kept up with Dick through his missions with the League, the random visits Dick made home or to his office, or occasional status reports delivered informally by text.

He hadn’t gotten a status update in two weeks.

His blood froze. “Too long,” he replied through clenched teeth. “Why? What did you find?”

Tim inhaled a deep breath. “Ok. I went to his apartment. No one was there, but… His security system, you know, the booby-traps we helped him install last year?” Bruce nodded. He had insisted on security systems for every member of his household living elsewhere.

“All deactivated. I was basically able just to walk inside. When I got in there, his place was all cleaned out. I mean, _clean_ , B. It’s as if he was going on a long mission off-planet, but… He isn’t,” Tim hesitated. “Is he?” He demanded.

Bruce shook his head. “Not to my knowledge. Were there any signs of battle? Struggle? A note?” He asked.

Tim shook his head. “Nothing. Except this,” he pulled out his phone and tilted the screen toward Bruce. He glanced down, and instantly recognized The Flying Graysons poster that lived above Dick’s bed. It had since he was nine years old. And though Bruce hadn’t spent an extraordinarily long time staring at it, he still knew that poster like he knew his parent’s wedding album.

In the middle, right where John Grayson’s lithe body was stuck in an eternal soar alongside his family, there was a hole. Miniscule. Barely noticeable, but there. Right in the center of his head. Bruce’s fists clenched.

“Bullet-hole,” he growled.

“Exactly,” Tim agreed, stashing his phone in his back pocket. “You know that with the exception of Jason, almost all of us avoid guns like the plague.”

“So… He was… taken?” A new voice asked. Bruce didn’t jump, not anymore, but he did stiffen. Sometimes, Cassandra’s training was so complete she seemed to defy existence. The air that needed to move around her just stilled. Her footsteps were like pinpricks.

Tim moved aside with a nod of greeting, allowing her into the circle. “I don’t think so. There were literally no other signs of struggle. I tested the air and furniture. No hypnotics, sleeping agents or toxic gas of any kind. So, if someone did take him, it was with his consent, or…” He trailed off, voice hitching. Bruce waved his hand impatiently. He would not even begin contemplating that theory until he had sound reason to do so.

Not again.

“He left of his own free-will,” Bruce finished. Cassandra’s face darkened.

“Bullet,” she pointed out.

“Just because none of you-”

“Except Jason,” Tim mumbled.

“Likes guns doesn’t mean you can’t use them, and Dick has his state issued firearm from the station,” Bruce growled. “Did you find that?”

“Another problem,” Tim replied. “Dick literally called in sick last weekend. But I called Amy, you know she keeps an eye on him since she discovered Nightwing, and she says he’d been acting strange. Jumpy. Paranoid. Almost obsessive.”

“Master Bruce,” Alfred intercepted, coming around the corner. He had a towel thrown over one arm, and the edges of his mouth were pinched with displeasure. “Your dinners will become cold if you…”

Alfred’s next words tapered off when he noticed their expressions. “What is it?” he asked, immediately. His eyes, beloved and familiar and dark, landed on Bruce first. He must have read something in his eyes because he stiffened imperceptibly. “Master Richard?” He inquired, calm despite the slight tremble Bruce saw go through his hands.

“Is missing,” Tim blurted. “You haven’t spoken to him lately, have you Alfred?”

“Why, yes, I did,” Alfred replied with a scowl. “Just last week in fact. He said he was going hiking with a friend and inquired if I could send him appropriate sustenance. Protein bars, dried fruit, etc. He said the trip would be no more than a few hours,” Alfred hesitated, fear flitting across his eyes.

“Why, he asked even for a cupcake. The same kind I made him for his sixteenth birthday, do you recall?” Bruce did recall, because that had been the last birthday Dick had spent at home. They had been fighting for months, but Dick’s birthday had been a rare spot of peace in the household before the fighting began anew and he left.

It was a good memory. Cherished. Prized. Beautiful.

Why would Dick want a reminder of it?

Bruce’s skin seared with sudden alarm. “Jason,” he called, storming past the others back into the dining room. Jason and Damian, thankfully, had been separated. Jason sat on the left side of the table, picking at his teeth with a toothpick while watching Stephanie teach Damian rock, paper, scissors.

“Ha! I win!” Damian cried, delighted as he laid down a harsh fist.

“And so, the pupil surpasses the master,” Steph agreed good-naturedly. “Hey!” she cried upon noticing them. “Can we eat now?”

“Has anyone been in contact with Dick lately? Jason? Babs?” Bruce demanded with a seriousness that made them all sit up straighter in their chairs.

“I saw him last week at the hospital. Monday.” Jason answered immediately.

“He texted me a few days ago,” Babs replied. “Sent me a picture of us back in the old days that I didn’t know he had. Teased me about how old we’d gotten. But before that…” she hesitated, and Bruce took a step forward.

“Barbara? This is important. He’s missing and we don’t have a clue where or when it happened,” he said quickly. He saw Damian clutch his knife from the corner of his eye, a growl of Al- Ghul loathing peeking past his lips.

Barbara’s eyes steeled. “He called me a while ago, exhausted, scared. It was nearly 3am. He had just gotten off patrol and he… Bruce, he said that he kept seeing his father. John Grayson. He was shaky because he’d watched his father follow him for miles.”

Bruce blinked, a shiver of sympathy wracking him. None of them were immune to nightmares, but if Dick had seen John Grayson following him _for miles_ … Bruce shook his head. “And you didn’t think to _tell_ me?” He demanded.

“Or anyone?” Tim added.

Barbara pinched the bridge of her nose. “He promised me he was fine. He promised me he’d go to the Watchtower or Wally’s house and get some rest near people. We chalked it up to exhaustion.”

“Doubt it,” Tim said. “I just went to his apartment. It’s empty. And there’s a bullet hole in the Flying Graysons poster above his bed. Right where John Grayson would have been,” Tim looked up. “B, what if he shot at that poster himself?” He whispered, horrified. Dick loved that poster. He had kept it almost obsessively clean since he’d been a kid, and no one could dispute how much he loved and missed his father. For him to lash out like that…

“All of you prepare,” He commanded. “Something is going on. Nightwing is missing. I want answers. _Now_ ,” before he had even finished, the others were shoving themselves from the table or scrambling toward the grandfather clock.

Alfred sidled up to him. “Shall I… Contact Master Clark, sir?” He wondered. Bruce shook his head.

“Not yet. Not until we know what…What _now?”_ He groaned, just as his phone began to vibrate in his back pocket. Bruce contemplated ignoring it. The last thing he cared about at the moment was Wayne Industries, but a niggling thought at the back of his head insisted.

_What if it’s Dick?_

He glanced at the caller ID. It was obscured, empty of information. Bruce’s gut clenched. “Hello?” He forced his voice to sound calm as he answered. Alfred studied his face intently.

“Mr. Wayne,” a dark voice greeted. It sounded husky, a bit like Two-Face when he was torn between identities. Or J’onn when he was in his Martian form.

In essence, it sounded inhuman.

“Yes. Who is this?” He asked.

“Do you want your son to die?” The voice continued. Bruce narrowed his eyes, rage kindling in his chest. He opened his mouth to reply when he heard it. Screaming. It was further away, he could tell, but it was in the background, the low guttural shrieks of an animal in pain.

He wished he could say the sound was foreign to him. But he had known Dick Grayson for too long and in too many unfortunate situations. He waved Alfred closer. _Get the kids. Have Oracle track this phone_ , he mouthed. Alfred gave a swift nod and rushed to do as he had been told.

“What do you want?” He asked into the phone. Playing the stupid millionaire was unlikely to help anyone now. Someone was making Dick scream for a reason. Bruce wanted nothing more than to make it stop. “Money?”

“Oh Batman,” the voice chuckled, making a shudder run up Bruce’s spine. His mouth went dry just as Barbara and Tim appeared, tablets already working. “Nothing so ignorant. We merely want you. I trust you can trace this phone. Would you like to say something to Nightwing?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he forced. “Please, where is my son?”

“So, you do want him to die,” was the returned lament. “Pity. Dickie, come say goodbye,” A long groan, either of agony or defiance, Bruce didn’t know, came from the other side. “Fine. Have it your way. Oh, and a word to the wise, don’t come with any of your other birds, Batman. You wouldn’t want to lose everyone at the same time. Trust me,” the last words were spoken with venom.

Bruce locked eyes with Oracle. She gave a swift nod. _Got it,_ she mouthed.

“Get here within the next six hours, Batman. Bruce. Whatever you go by this time. Or your first Robin dies.”

“B!” A voice suddenly yelled. It was parched, strained and sounded more like a child than… At his sides, his fingers clenched hard enough to tear skin. “B, don’t come here! It’s a _trap!_ Please, let me go…!”

The line went silent, and Bruce chucked the phone across the room.


	2. Feb 15th & April 12th

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three months before Dicks disappearance, he makes a visit to Jason's apartment. 
> 
> The day of his disappearance, he listens to a fond voicemail.

_Three Months Earlier:_

_February 15 th, 3:24PM_

Jason’s door was a tattered affair, a complete set of chipped doorframe; a welcome mat that looked more like a series of vomit ridden rags tied together and a faded black pot that Dick knew hid a motion sensor and camera.

It was a far cry from the manor.

 _At least he’s being safe about it_ , Dick thought, peering closely into the tangle of wilted brown vines. He caught a glint of metal and grinned. It was a gun of some sort, probably able to shoot either pepper spray or a tranquilizer. Home-made. Nice.

“Jason,” he called, shoving his hands into his pockets. He’d prefer not to get electrocuted by Jason’s door if he could help it. He wondered why his brother, who _knew_ he carried around electrified katana sticks, would have assumed he hadn’t heard the faint whine of wires. “I know you’re there. Jaaasssooon,” he whistled.

There was a solid clunk as a lock was released. The faint buzzing vanished, replaced instead with a creak as the door opened. Jason stood on the other side, his mouth pinched into a thin line of barely concealed rage. He also had a narrow, freshly polished pistol in hand. Dick raised a brow over the barrel directed at his nose.

“Hey little wing,” he chirped.

Jason narrowed his eyes. “Have I not made myself clear? You and your clan of freaks are _not welcome on my turf_ ,” he growled between clenched teeth, finger twitching near the trigger. Dick flashed a smile.

“You were clear,” he assured Jason, lest he begin doubting his communication skills. “That’s why I came alone. No masks. No, er,” he glanced down at the pistol. “Weapons of any sort. I come in peace, as a messenger from a mutual friend.”

Jason didn’t look convinced. He changed his stance, minutely, to better withstand the kick back of a pistol going off. A clear sign of irritation. Dick did not waver from his casual, non-aggressive stance. “I swear Dick, if Bruce sent you, I’m mailing your corpse back bullet riddled…”

“Bruce is out of country,” Dick interrupted. “Business event with Tim. He doesn’t know I’m here. Alfred sent me.”

Jason snorted. “To do what?”

“He’s alone in the manor. Damian is staying with a private tutor in Tibet,” Jason’s low hum told Dick he knew _exactly_ what Damian was learning in Tibet. “I think only Cassie is there, but she’s skulking the city with Steph right now. Alfred has only seen you a few times since you came back, and never alone. He sent me here to ask if you wanted tea.”

“Why didn’t he come then?”

“I convinced him I had a better chance of surviving a mugging on this side of town, which, you’ve gotta admit, isn’t a terrible assumption,” he looked over his shoulder pointedly, where the air suddenly exploded with a quick spatter of pops. Gunshots. They were nearby too. Dick glanced back to Jason, to see if he was disturbed, but his younger brother hardly blinked, so Dick let it go.

“Can you survive a bullet wound?” Jason barked.

Dick sighed. _Such violence._ “Depends on where you shoot me. Listen, Jay, I know things are tense between you and the family right now…”

“ _What_ family?”

“But we both know you wouldn’t shoot an unarmed man,” he raised his hands, palms up, to show Jason that he wasn’t bluffing. “We also both know I’m not that easy to dissuade, so lets just drop pretenses ok? I’m not lying or trying to trick you. Alfred really wants to see you again. He sent me. Are you coming or not?”

Jason was silent a long moment, his eyes never leaving Dick’s. His eyes scanned his person, quickly, obviously judging how harmless Dick was. Finally, he lowered the pistol. It didn’t escape Dick’s attention that he kept a finger on the trigger. “Bruce is gone?” He demanded. Dick nodded.

“Won’t be back until tomorrow afternoon.”

“And where will _you_ be?”

“Barbara and I are working on something downstairs. We won’t disturb your visit time. You don’t hate Babs too, do you?”

Jason gave a mild half-shrug. “Eh, she has her own bad history with the Joker. I can’t say I feel anything at all, except sorry that she’s still in love with your dumbass.”

“I’ve tried to talk her out of it, man, believe me. So…?”

“Tell Alfred that I’ll be there within the hour, after I corroborate your story.”

“What exactly do you think we’re going to do to you?”

Jason snorted. Shoved his pistol into a holster behind his back. “Trick me to the manor so you can capture me and lock me up as a criminal psychopath?” He suggested. Dick recoiled, even though he had suspected Jason would think of something like that. Yet the idea of locking up his little brother was enough to make him nauseous. And he had fought Dr. Vertigo face to face without flinching.

“I did mention I’m unarmed, didn’t I? How the hell would I do that?” He demanded. Jason didn’t answer. Only narrowed his eyes at Dick.

“One hour,” he snapped, and before Dick could respond or ask anything more, Jason slammed the door. The metallic lock clicked into place a second later. Dick sighed and swiveled on a heel. Despite the rickety fashion of stairs and lack of audience, he backflipped from the fifth stair, landed with a flourish. He fished for the phone in his back pocket and pressed the button.

Alfred answered on the second ring. “Yes, Master Dick?” He asked.

“I got him, Alfred. He’ll be there within an hour. Start the oven and prepare the cookies of celebration,” he reported. 

“Very good, Master Dick,” Alfred replied, in his usual monotone. Dick could hear the pleasure there though, and grinned. It was a rare and good day when one could please Alfred.

“Anything special you want me to pick up?”

“If you could procure brown sugar from the…”

“I got it. Ice cream?”

“Nothing larger than a pint or two. We don’t need to save it for when your father and brothers return. Master Damian is a terrible sugar fanatic.”

“Oh, I remember,” he assured Alfred with a bitter laugh. Damian on a sugar high was _not cool._ “Anything else?”

“No. Thank you, Master Dick.”

“Thank _you,_ Governor,” Dick sniffed, in his best imitation of Alfred’s English accent. Alfred snorted a laugh on the other end, and the line clicked off. Dick whistled back to his car, twirled his keys in hand _. Before I pick up those supplies, couldn’t hurt to check out those…_

The thought tapered away before it could be finished. Jason had been very clear with them. Any sight of Batman or his associates on this side of town would result in a practical vigilante war. Neither Gotham nor Dick wanted that outcome, and he’d never forgive himself if he would be the one to start it.

Yet doing nothing when someone could potentially be dying didn’t sit well with him. He sat outside of his half-broken buggy for a moment, torn.

Then, faintly, he heard it. More gunshots, but this time, they weren’t in quick succession. They were spaced out. Timed. Perfectly aimed so that they hit their target and not civilians. Dick didn’t know of any criminals with that kind of restraint or ability on this side of Gotham.

Which could only mean…

Dick grinned. “That’s my boy,” he chuckled. Reassured that everything was well in order, he swooped into the car and drove back to the side of town he was supposed to be in, to pick up cookie ingredients.

* * *

_April 12 th, 1:12 PM_

In April, the Amazon Rainforest swelled, as if the moisture which normally saturated the air sat, fat and plump, in every leaf the forest had. Since the trees were at least two stories, that moisture drizzled from the sky in a persistent downpour. He could have laughed.

If not for the suffocating heat, it might have been Gotham, shadowed, alive with the frantic hoots and grumbles of life and death, and perpetually wet. Nightwing inhaled a deep breath, felt the air sift and settle in his lungs like smoke, and pressed play on the slick screen of his phone.

“Hey dickface,” Jason’s voice greeted, with an unusual undertone of glee. “Just letting you know I am currently at Johnny’s sipping a caramel mocha shake -your favorite – and I am still the shake champion. Isn’t that right, Babs?” He could hear Barbara grumbling in the background.

Then a half-shout, half-shriek as someone else, Damian? Probably got brain freeze. “Ha ha! That’s what you get, you little brat! Anyway, Dickie, I just thought you should know for future reference,” Dick’s mouth curled into a dim half smile.

There was more to the message, but it was snatched by a sudden gust of wind. Dick shivered, despite the heat. He stood below a monstrous cavern’s entrance, the jagged edges of the ceiling like the fangs of some huge monster. The cave was a series of tunnels, carved out by ancient people’s generations before, and left abandoned for near a century. They sloped deep into the Earth, hundreds of feet down.

It would be all too easy to get lost.

Perhaps that was why he needed Jason’s voice; his cocky baritone a reminder of everything he had to lose. The history of the batfamily was complex and full of grief, but Dick never tired of hearing the voice of his younger siblings.

“Anyway,” Jason continued, the voicemail crackling slightly. Nightwing cringed, curled his fingers tighter around the phone in his hand. He was too far out. It was a miracle his phone worked at all. “Whenever you get back from this weird mission of yours, you can come fight me for malt champion. And, uh…”

Jason hesitated, as if unsure whether his recipient would even listen this long. Nightwing leaned closer, pressed the phone to his ear. “Hey, thanks for… Whatever weird Grayson voodoo crap you’ve been pulling on me these past few months,” a rough crackle as he cleared his throat. “Yeah. So, um, bye, big bird,” it was the longest, and possibly nicest, message Dick had ever been left.

He exhaled a slow breath, trying to release the tension in his chest and shoulders. It was always harder to fight while tense. One of the earliest lessons Batman had taught him.

“Bye Jaybird,” he whispered, to the voice of his brother thousands of miles away. His stomach clenched into painful knots. Jason would never know the real reason Nightwing had cancelled their malt drinking contest, but people vanished on missions all the time. Heroes were never guaranteed long lives.

He momentarily debated listening to the message again; but shook his head. He had delayed long enough. The sooner he could finish, the sooner it could all end. _That’s all I want, and it’s for the best,_ he steeled himself, glancing into the darkness of the cave. It looked almost like silk, as if he could pierce it with a needle and light would come beaming from behind the shadows. Nightwing let the phone slip through his fingers. It landed against the cold rock of the cave with an echoing clack. 

It only took a few jabs with the edge of his heel to destroy it.

He crushed the tiny square chip phone a few more times for good measure. He knew that Babs had installed about fourteen layers of tracking software into all their devices, and he couldn’t afford to have Tim or Barbara find him before this mission was over. Nightwing reached up, lightly, and peeled away the mask clinging to his eyes.

Dick Grayson’s face was exposed in a flash of hot air.

“I’m here,” he whispered, his voice somehow echoing past the blood rushing in his ears. Nothing replied, but he hadn’t expected it too. “Well, if I’m going out,” he supposed. “It won’t be quietly.” Noise was a type of defiance.

“I know you hear me,” he said again, louder. The cave rumbled, a shudder of wind that sent a shiver up his spine. His knees felt weak, but Dick Grayson did not falter. Nightwing would have, with the logistics and observations that controlled his mind when in that persona.

But this wasn’t about logic. It was about family.

He tipped his chin back, bit his bottom lip, and forced out a long exhale in the form of a whistle.

And, whistling, he journeyed into the heart of the cave.


	3. February 15th

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Babs and Dick discover a shadow watching in some post-battle footage. Wally breaks bat-cave protocol. Jason plays the role of acting adult.

_February 15th, 5:45PM_

“So, how exactly did you convince your semi-deranged brother to visit again?” Wally asked, around a mouthful of Dick’s favorite trail mix. Dick reached for the multi-colored bag, swiped at it halfheartedly when Wally held it above their heads.

“He’s not deranged, he’s… Damaged.”

“I know. That’s why I said semi,” Wally agreed, holding the bag out for Barbara to grab a handful of M&M’s and peanuts. She popped them into her mouth, eyes glued to the giant screens around them. Dick watched her, smiling. When Babs sat before a computer, the glint of light reflecting off her glasses, mind racing and heart set on saving as many people as possible, he found himself falling harder for her every night.

He wondered if he could love her any more if he tried.

“He can talk anyone into anything if he really tries,” Babs piped in.

“Ah, thanks babe,” he cooed, genuinely touched. Barbara gave him a wry look.

“It wasn’t a compliment. You’re a manipulative bastard.”

“I didn’t manipulate anyone this time!” He cried, flinging himself into the nearest chair when Wally refused his advances on the Trailmix once again. The rolling seat spun backwards, thrown by his weight. Dick groaned as he stared into the darkness of the cave roof. “D’you think Batman has cameras up there in the bat nests?”

Wally choked on his next gulping of nuts. “ _Dude,”_ he gasped, rocking forward to thump his chest. “You’ve never checked? You know he does,” Wally demanded, squinting at the bat nests suspiciously. “He probably has a missile silo hidden up there too. Have you _seriously_ never checked?”

“I didn’t want to disturb the bats!”

“Ah, and there is your fatal flaw. Compassion has been the end of many men,” Wally sighed dramatically. He waved at the ceiling. “Hey Bruce!”

“No names in the cave,” Dick and Barbara scolded in unison.

“Your children are bossy as ever, Bats!” Wally continued.

Dick chuckled and tugged at the edge of Wally’s mask, hanging limp around his neck. “It wasn’t even my idea, originally. Alfred may have suggested that he missed Jason and was going to his place to ask him if he would visit him sometime. I volunteered in his stead. All is well.”

“Nothing has exploded yet,” Barbara agreed. “Hey, look at this,” she pointed to the screen. Wally and Dick turned to see a frozen photograph. Several bodies were suspended in time in front of them, including Dick himself as Nightwing. His eyes scanned the cartwheel he had been in the middle of, then skipped to the others. “It’s footage from your fight with Scarecrow last night, Dick.”

“Names,” Wally mumbled. “Cops there too?”

“BPD,” Dick clarified, nodding to the other uniformed bodies. “I may have put in an anonymous call, since Scarecrow was alone. I figured we’d finish quicker that way.”

“And you were right,” Barbara agreed. “However, since Scarecrow escaped, I tried looking for another exit or entry place and look,” she pointed to a prone body in the corner. “He knocked out several officers, but there are a few on the outskirts who were never near him. How did they get clonked?”

“Can you zoom in?” Wally asked. Barbara did so. Dick leaned forward, studied the landscape again. “Hey, look at that,” Wally pointed to the far left, and Dick squinted.

“Damn,” he cursed, recoiling when he noticed a dark form hovering over one of the officers. At first glance, it could have been a mere shadow of the large crates, or perhaps a stray cop, but Dick had worked with a practical shadow for most of his life. He knew the difference between a solid body and a trick of the light.

“Who the hell is that?” Wally demanded.

“No clue. I didn’t even see him last night,” Dick replied, stomach twisting. He hadn’t made such a rookie mistake since he was thirteen, at least, and not noticing a second target was _very rookie._

“He’s only on the outskirts, and you were kinda busy,” Barbara reminded him, rubbing her chin. “He never even enters the official fight. And he only shows up once. Then he’s gone.”

“So, was he there to observe, or there to help Scarecrow?” Wally asked.

Barbara sighed. “Why knock out cops if he’s observing? He could have been hired help. Someone sent only to help Scarecrow escape, and then vanish,” she suggested. Dick nodded.

“A mercenary, then, but why didn’t I see him?” He demanded.

“Maybe you did, but since it wasn’t an immediate threat, you prioritized him for later, but he vanished.”

“B would be pissed,” Dick sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Yeah, but, when isn’t he?” Wally snorted. He slapped Dick on the thigh; and offered the trail-mix a second later. “C’mon, buddy, you’re being too hard on yourself. Most people wouldn’t have noticed shadow man there, especially not while taking on Scarecrow himself. Besides, he’s probably only a minor player. You know,” he ventured quietly. “I could literally run through this whole city and find Scarecrow in maybe thirty minutes…” he offered. Dick smiled.

“Thanks for the offer Wally, but we all know B would have our collective asses,” he reminded them.

“What B doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”

“The cameras hiding amidst the bat nests say otherwise,” Dick laughed. Wally looked momentarily terrified. Then he settled with a laugh.

“Ah, he wouldn’t kill you, Dickie. You’re everyone’s fav in the Watchtower. Diana would literally flip her shit.”

“Who won’t kill Dick-face? Because if he needs to die, I volunteer to be executioner,” a new voice declared from the top of the stairs. Dick and Barbara exchanged a look of astonishment when Jason descended cautiously, staring at the Bat-Cave as if he suspected it would transform into a lion and eat him alive.

“Jason?” Wally gasped, voicing everyone’s surprise.

“Flash,” Jason greeted dryly. “You know B would have a conniption if he knew you all were in here without masks on.”

“I thought you were CEO of Fuck Bat Inc.” Wally sniped back. _That’s it. My best friend has just died,_ Dick thought, with a lucid sort of panic, but Jason just laughed.

“That I am. Very profitable business, if you didn’t know,” Wally’s mouth twitched at the corners, even as he glanced at Dick for confirmation.

_What do we do?_

Well, treating Jason like a rabid dog wasn’t going to help matters any. “Where’s Alfred?” He asked.

“Sleeping,” Jason replied curtly. “I’ll have you know Alfie has been secretly nursing a head cold for a week now and none of you asses noticed. Though, I doubt even he would have known it, stubborn old man,” Jason shook his head fondly. At the mention of sickness, Dick had already sprung from his seat, Wally a beat behind him. Barbara pushed herself away from the computer, eyebrows pinched.

“He’s sick? How bad? Does he need…?”

“Whoa there, mama bat. He’s fine. I said he’s sleeping, didn’t I? He made me sit down with him in the study and read Monte Cristo to him. Passed out halfway through Chapter five. I carried him to bed,” he said. Dick relaxed, fractionally. Now that he thought about it, he did recall a few instances where he had noticed Alfred sagging in his work.

“That’s adorable, Jay,” Dick gushed.

Jason rolled his eyes. “Go to hell. I came down here to make sure you hadn’t irritated Oracle to death.”

“My hero,” Barbara replied dryly. She aimed an accusing finger at their younger brother, eyes darkening. “Cut the crap, Jason, you just don’t want to leave. You know your old room is open?” There she was. Cutting through crap and exorcising demons. Jason harrumphed, crossed his arms. The white bang atop his head curled into his eyes. He flicked it away irritably.

“I’d rather not,” Jason snapped.

“Hey,” Dick interjected before a fight could begin. He didn’t want Jason storming out _again_. “Do you know of any mercenaries helping out Scarecrow?”

“Scarecrow?” Jason glanced at the photo. “No… Scarecrow doesn’t even have the bank to hire a mercenary. All his investments in Crime Alley have been flushed out courtesy of yours truly. Why?”

“ _Someone_ helped him escape last night,” Dick mumbled.

“Was it Hatter? Poison Ivy? They’ve worked with him before,” Jason suggested. Dick shook his head.

“No. Hatter is still in Bel Reve and Ivy was last spotted in China. Meaning, Wally just got here from China to report that she’s there,” he turned back to the screen, hummed. “I don’t like this.”

“B will like it even less,” Barbara agreed. She reached out to squeeze his hand. “But its fine. Scarecrow will crawl out of his hole eventually, and then we can identify this mystery helper of his.”

“Scarecrow is so seven years ago anyway,” Wally drawled. Dick rolled his eyes.

“Jay, since you’re still here, will you storm out if I make a proposition?” He asked. Jason shifted feet uncomfortably, silent. Dick took it as a negative. “The Circus will be in town in a couple of days. What do you say if we…?”

Jason let out an explosive groan that rivaled the ones Damian let out whenever Dick told him to eat his vegetables. _All little brothers are alike, really_. “Really, Dick-face? The Circus? You want _me_ to go to a circus with _you_?” Jason demanded. “What are we, ten?”

“I go to the circus every year,” Dick protested, with a smile. “Besides, we aren’t going to see any shows. I have the back-stage set-up,” he pointed out.

“Ah, yeah! Haley’s Circus is coming!” Wally laughed, clapping his hands in realization. At the name, Jason gave a start. He had evidently forgotten that there was only one circus that Dick ever went too, and it was rarely to the actual show.

“Is this a nostalgia thing?” Jason asked suspiciously. 

“It’s a family thing, hence why I go alone every year. But this time,” a half shrug. “I could use the company.”

Jason scowled. “Doubt you want my company, Dickie.”

He didn’t blink. “This is the place where my parents were murdered Jay. I wouldn’t have asked if I _really_ didn’t want you there.” They held each other’s gazes for a long moment, Jay seemingly searching for confirmation in his eyes. Wally and Barbara glanced between the two, Wally with the same vibrating anticipation he always displayed, and Barbara with some trepidation.

Finally, Jason threw up his hands. “Fine. Fine. I’ll go to the stupid circus with you, but I won’t like it,” he growled. It was a better answer than Dick had expected. He couldn’t help the wide grin that split his cheeks. Jason rolled his eyes. “Don’t look at me like that. I just need something to do this weekend. I’ve polished all my guns,” he growled.

“Ooh, scary,” Wally snorted from the side. “What’ve you got? Like four of them? You want to see some real polishing action, you oughta catch sight of my shoes,” he said. Jason ogled Wally as if he had forgotten he was there, or rather, that he was ever alive in the first place. Dick bit his bottom lip. Wally seemed to have an odd relationship with each of his siblings. With Jason he sported a casual, you-don’t-frighten-me attitude that was liable to get him injured.

Jason, to his surprise, just snorted. “What are you even doing here, West?” he demanded. “Bats hasn’t revoked your clearance yet?”

Wally twirled in his seat, chuckled. “Oh, plenty of times. Dick or Alfred always let me in though.”

“Of fucking course,” Jason murmured. Barbara straightened her glasses, propped them onto her nose as she stared at Jason, something like compassion in her eyes.

“You know, if you want to use the Cave…” She began, but Jason raised a hand.

“No thanks, Oracle. I’m only here out of mask because B isn’t. I don’t want to be here if there’s even a slight chance he could show up,” he said. _Why was I expecting that?_

“Are you leaving soon?” Dick asked, waving to the computers. As much as he loved listening to his younger brother chat, they also needed to continue working. “Or are you gonna help us with this case?”

“Nah. I’ll leave,” he shoved his hands into his pockets, shrugged. “With strict instructions on how to make Alfred’s favorite tea, since no one around here seems to understand the fundamentals of life. Like how to use a damn teapot.”

“I know how to use a teapot!” Dick cried.

Jason looked unconvinced. “ _Strict instructions_ ,” he repeated, enunciating each syllable as if he suspected Dick hadn’t understood the first time. “Make sure he follows them, West,” he ordered Wally, who gave a finger salute, grinning impishly.

Dick didn’t like how quickly they had begun plotting against him, but he was also happy that Jason seemed to be interacting with _someone_. “I’ll walk you out,” he offered.

“You know I snuck in, right? To avoid B’s cameras?”

“I’ll sneak you back out,” he insisted. Jason just shrugged.

“Whatever,” he mumbled, looking away. Dick took it as a good sign.

“Take care out there, Jason,” Barbara called as Jason turned to leave. “And you know that if you need anything- I mean _anything_ – you can tap into my private line, right?”

A mock gasp. “Stop flirting with me, Babs, your boy wonder is _right here_ ,” he gasped. Barbara chucked a batarang at his head, and he quickly ducked. Jason’s smile was at once sad and disparaging. “Alright, alright… I know, boss. I won’t call, but I know you’re always open.”

“Good,” she turned back to the computers, along with Wally. Dick almost laid a hand on Jason’s shoulder before he remembered that this was neither Damian nor Tim.

He and Jason headed toward the garage, passing the red-carpeted halls and high-ceilings that had once scared Dick so badly he hadn’t been able to breathe for fear he might break something. Sometimes, Bruce’s vast wealth still scared him.

He wondered if it scared Jason too. Maybe that was why he wouldn’t come home.

“Hey,” he blurted. “You know Bab’s offer is mine, too, right? If you ever need company, or a place to crash, you know I’m in Bludhaven now…” Jason rammed an elbow into his ribs so hard Dick’s breath hitched and he instinctively stiffened.

“Nope. We’ve done enough bonding for today, Dickface. Don’t push it. I came here for Alfred. I don’t need nor want your friendship,” he snapped, gravelly voice dark as Red Hood’s growl to criminals. Dick took a moment to rub the ripening bruise along his sides.

“I don’t _need_ you to accept my friendship Jay,” he replied after a moment of wincing. “I just want you to know it’s there.”

“Message received,” Jason replied curtly. He huffed a dark laugh. “I still don’t know why you don’t invite the demon or replacement to go circus hopping with you.”

The term sent a shiver down his spine. He swiped at Jason’s head automatically, but Jason only ducked, an impish grin in place. “Tim’s gone with me once,” Dick confessed. “So has Dami, Cass and Steph. You’re the only one I’ve never taken with me.”

“Oh, so I’m your last pick?”

“What? Do you want to be my _first_ pick, Jay?”

“Shut up.” Dick smiled.

They were silent a moment. Dick let it be. They were almost to the garage anyway, the dozens of antique and expensive sports cars spread over wet concrete and metal. It was an empty, echoing, cold place. It was also without any of Bruce’s extensive security protocols, half because it had been built as a nuclear bunker during the Cold War.

“Listen,” Jason began, hesitantly. “I was thinking… If you want, I know this malt place downtown. Maybe… Like, after the circus, we could go…”

“Yes!” Dick burst out. Jason eyed him suspiciously, so Dick cleared his throat. “I-I mean, sure. Yes. I’d like that, Littlewing.”

Jason’s eyes crinkled at the corner with his sharkish grin. “Stop acting like you’re a kid with a crush, Dickface,” he mocked. Dick laughed and raised his eyes.

“Sorry, sorry… It’s just that… I’ve missed you Jason,” he ignored the gagging noises Jason made in reply. _Little brothers._ Jason started down the stairs into the garage, his fluid movements near silent. If he hadn’t been staring at him, Dick might have mistaken him for a figment of his imagination. “I guess I’ll see you later?” He called.

Jason spared a nonchalant wave of the hand. “Whatever!” He yelled over one shoulder. Dick watched him until his silhouette was lost in the shadows of the garage and his footsteps had blended into the silence.

Smiling, he jammed his hands in his pockets and swerved on a heel to leave.


	4. Feb 17th

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tim and Dick have a phone conversation about brotherhood. Bruce is eavesdropping from the shower.

_February 17 th, 10:57 PM_

Tim didn’t often question his life. It was odd, but true.

He loved knowledge, the thrill of mystery and the complete triumph of outsmarting whatever villain messed with the world that day, but there were some questions he’d rather avoid having answered.

The weird, screwed-up dichotomy of his chosen family, for example? Yeah, he just… Didn’t. There were pros and cons for that. But he didn’t.

Until today.

“What do you mean, he just came into the manor? Had tea, tucked in Alfred and left? Did he steal anything?”

“No, baby bird,” Dick replied, in that very patient, exasperatedly fond way of his. Tim leaned back in the desk chair of the Golden Suites Hotel. Outside, he could see the twinkling lights of Moscow, obscured by the swirling snow. “I think I’m getting through to him. The blood-lust is wearing off…”

“Supposedly,” Tim pointed out.

Dick sighed. “Good enough, Timmy. And so long as he doesn’t need to look at Bruce, he’s getting better at, y’know, being himself again.”

Tim barely held back a snort. He hadn’t known Jason as well as he would have liked before the Joker, but from the few stories he’d heard, he had been compassionate, fiery and a little unhinged. Tim wasn’t sure if that personality had a place among them anymore.

_Or maybe you’re afraid you wouldn’t have a place among them anymore?_

Tim shook himself out of his thoughts. “Is there no one sensible there to talk you out of this? Babs? Steph? Cass?” He asked.

“I have plenty of sense!”

“Like, _no one_?”

“You’re so cute when you’re being over-protective, Tim,” Dick replied dryly. Tim forced a smile, leaning forward to scrub a hand down his face. He hadn’t slept in perhaps three days, the constant bustle of business meetings and tours and luncheons and dinners and post-dinner meetings more exhausting than any other kind of work he could be doing.

“Dick, I’m sorry. I know he’s important to you. You want to believe in him, but… He’s changed. He’s damaged.” _He tried to kill me._ “He’s dangerous.”

“The same could be said for all of us,” Dick argued. “We kinda do insane, dangerous stuff because of our irrevocably changed, damaged pasts, Tim-bo.”

“Yeah? Have you shot anyone lately, Dick? Because I can’t even kick a puppy without feeling bad and I _hate dogs_.”

“You hate Damian’s dogs, you mean,” that was true. Though, it was of no fault to the dogs. Mainly it was just...

“I mean, I hate Damian too.”

“Tim,” Dick reproached, sharply. Tim cleared his throat, chastened. Though it never ceased to sting that Dick protected Damian with a fierceness he had never shown Tim at all. Dick sighed. “Listen, let’s not argue about this, ok? When are you and Bruce getting home? I bought the new version of monkey cars and I need to beat your ass.”

Tim snorted. “Sure, you can, buddy. Sure,” he chuckled at Dick’s affronted stuttering. “Well, we have some heavy snow going on right now,” another glance revealed that it was falling even faster now. “So we’re kinda trapped. Tell Alfred we might stay awhile. Or permanently. Bruce and I are Russian now.”

Dick burst into laughter. “Can… Can you imagine Bruce trying to wear a borstrock?” He asked. Tim tried to envision it; and could only sigh.

“Why do you ruin all my dreams?” He lamented. Dick laughed harder and Tim counted it a victory. As if summoned, the hotel door flicked open and Bruce Wayne himself walked inside, tugging at the tie around his neck impatiently.

“Is that Alfred?” he asked when he noticed Tim with phone in hand.

“Dick,” Tim corrected. Bruce gave a curt nod and vanished into the bathroom, grumbling. “Are you and Bruce fighting again?” Tim wondered, turning back to the window.

Dick snorted. “When aren’t we fighting, you mean? Nah, Timmy. We had a slight disagreement about whether Damian deserved to be grounded _and_ benched from Robin while Bruce was away. We compromised, but he’s still butt-hurt,” that sounded about right for both men. Tim rolled his eyes.

“So, like, how long have you been a mother?” He asked, and over his shoulder, he shouted “Bruce, Dick says your face looks like butt!” He called.

Dick laughed. “Hey! I did not! Though, it isn’t like that’s a wrong assessment…”

Bruce poked his head out of the bathroom, black hair twirling in wet droplets behind his ears. “Tell my former ward _Richard_ _John Grayson_ , that when I return, he’ll _get_ what’s coming to him,” he replied, with perfect civility. He shut the door harshly behind him.

“Ooh, you hear that RJG?”

“Can you say my name in a way that doesn’t make me sound like an insurance company?” Dick drawled. Tim laughed. “And I heard. Great. Now you got me in trouble, Timbers. I didn’t know he even still remembered my full name.”

“Me neither. Hey, Bruce, what’s my full name!?”

“Go to _sleep,_ Timothy Jackson Drake-Wayne, we have an early meeting tomorrow!”

“Again!? Bruce, I’m tired! I’m exhausted! This is child labor!” Dick chuckled on the other end.

“Sue me,” Bruce replied over the spray of the shower, sounding nonplussed. Sometimes, Tim loved Bruce in these moods. He was dry and sarcastic in a funny way instead of an intimidating one, but he did tend to grouch about like a hibernating bear. He shrugged.

“Maybe I will,” he murmured.

“Seriously, you two good? Do you want me to book you separate rooms?” Dick asked, sounding a bit worried.

“I’m good. I think he’s driving me a little insane, but its affectionate insanity. Kinda like I always feel with you.”

“Awww, Tim, stop. You’ll make me cry,” Dick teased. “Well, I’ll let you get some rest and you should really _, actually_ rest, Timmy. Promise me.”

“I promise, mom.”

“Thank you. Tell B that Babs and I are holding down the fort just fine, so if he wants to try out that borstrock…” Tim hung up on him, but it was with the echo of Dick’s laughter filling his ears. He set it down, chuckling himself.

“How’s Gotham?” Bruce asked a moment later when he exited the shower, rubbing at his damp head busily. There was a plethora of meanings behind his asking that Tim had learned to discern. _Is everyone safe? Do they need us back? How are your brothers? Sisters? No one has died yet, have they?_

“Ah, you know, quiet and weird as ever,” he answered, which was simply, in their book, _the family is still safe. Still strong. Still fighting._

Bruce nodded. “Did he really say my face looked like a butt?”

“No. But I love sowing discord,” Bruce’s mouth quirked at the corners, which was as close to a full belly laugh as he could get in this persona.

“Me too, son. Me too.”


	5. Feb 22nd & March 2nd

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dick takes Jason to Haley's Circus for the first time and there are elephants involved, of course. 
> 
> Dick has the first of many nightmarish encounters.

_February 22 nd, 4:15PM_

As ever, Haley’s Circus opened before him like a parachute, as familiar and vibrant as if he had never left. It was one of the greatest- and most painful – aspects of these visits. Haley’s Circus was like a slot in time, notched into perpetual summer whenever it came to town.

The circus tent still smelled of licorice and dusty hay. Pop Haley’s voice reminded him of late nights on the trapeze, the skin of his knees stinging from where his quadruple flips possibly hadn’t stuck the landing. He had told Barbara, the first he had ever brought her to this circus, that hearing the voices of old friends was akin to watching shooting stars. It left one with a tight chest and glistening eyes, but with a smile.

Jason, despite his newness, seemed to feel the same. “Is that an elephant. Like, an elephant. Are you fucking _joking me,_ Dick-face, that’s a real elephant!” He yelped as the gentle beast reached out to swipe at his hair with a muscular trunk. The calf, still hiding shyly behind its mother’s leg despite Hermann employing every known trick to entice him out, scrambled backward at the shout.

“Shh, Jay, you’ll scare her!” Dick scolded, clapping a hand over his brother’s mouth. It didn’t tame Jason’s violent enthusiasm. He stretched out an arm to gently poke at Kira’s trunk. She gripped his middle finger tightly, letting out huffs of curiosity.

“You know elephants think we’re cute,” Hermann told them, beaming proudly from his spot near the calf. “Some of the most intelligent animals out there.”

“How do you cart them around?” Jason asked, awestruck. He slowly lowered himself to one knee and held out a hand for the calf to examine. She only slunk forward a bit, eyes narrowed in a semi-suspicious manner.

“On trains,” Hermann grunted. “It ain’t easy, and we have to stop all the time to give them air and space, but, its worth it. They perform better than we do,” he reached out to pat Kira on the knee, as if they were old friends. Dick supposed they were. Kira was the daughter of the elephant he had known as a child. Hermann had helped birth the now-mother.

 _I still miss mama Sheila though_ , he thought with a wistful sigh. “What can they do?”

“Mainly give wonder. We give kids rides all the time; or have them hold up our performers when they’re about to act. She can pick you up if you want,” Jason glanced at him, an unspoken question in his eyes. Dick shrugged.

“Hey, I’ve done it a thousand times. Not much to it,” he said.

“No, have you performed with them?”

“Not in a long time,” Dick replied, with a sad smile. Jason gave a single nod and turned back to Kira.

“You think you can pick me up, girl? Or are you too occupied with the squirt?” Kira smacked him upside the head fondly. “She reminds me of Alfred,” Jason observed, rubbing the spot. Dick snickered.

“Oh, hey pop!” Hermann suddenly shouted, waving. A shiver wracked his spine as Dick swiveled on a heel. He hadn’t seen Pop Haley since he and Jason had arrived twenty minutes before; and having been told that he was in a business meeting, refrained from looking.

“Hey! I thought you were in a meeting?” Dick cried as the elder man approached, yanking him into a tight hug immediately. Pop Haley was also like a summer breeze, smelling of sweat and clovers.

“Ended it early when I heard my boy was back home,” Pop replied, with the same quiet joviality of Dick’s childhood. He pushed Dick back, gripped his shoulders hard, and studied him. “You look good. Healthy. How are you?” Dick recognized the underlying worry. Pop Haley was one of the few people who knew both his identities, having deduced it from a media photo of Nightwing years earlier. Dick didn’t mind his knowing, though it had rankled Bruce for a few days.

He swiped the bangs from his face. “I’m doing great!” He said, trying to infuse his tone with as much sincerity as possible. “My coworkers just threw me a one-year anniversary party down at the station.”

“I can hardly believe it’s been a year,” Pop breathed, squeezing his shoulders. Pop was also one of the few people that Dick had sent photos too when he had graduated from the police academy. He gave a firm nod. “Knowing you, you’ve made friends even with the criminals. Betcha Bruce still grumbles every time he sees you in uniform.”

“Oh yeah. How’d you know?” Dick teased.

Pop tapped his nose, eyes twinkling. “Call it a magician’s intuition. How is the rest of the family, by the way?”

“Well…” Dick gestured to Jason, who had finally succeeded in finding a balance on the edge of Kira’s trunk. She was lifting him slowly, a wide grin stretched across his face as he was inchingly raised higher.

“Dick! Would you _look_ at this?!” He nearly shrieked, laughing.

Dick wondered how hard Jason would strike him if he were to sneak a picture now. “You look great, bro!” He agreed, surreptitiously nabbing the phone in his back pocket. Bruce would owe him big time. “That’s Jason, by the way. Second eldest. You remember, I’ve mentioned him? Jay, say hi!” He called.

Jason gave a distracted wave, which Pop returned, and Dick shook his head. “Me and Babs are looking for apartments together.”

“Oh, really!?”

He’d had a feeling Pop would be excited by that. He nodded, a bubble of joy unfurling in his chest. He so rarely got to gush about his life and family like this, the shadow of mystery that surrounded the Wayne’s just as necessary as the legends that followed the Bats. “Steph is on her last year of college. Tim is…. Well, he’s two weeks away from taking over Wayne Industries and then the world,” Pop chuckled.

“Cassie was accepted to join a troupe of some high-profile ballerinas. She’s _stoked_. Er, Wally and Artemis just moved in together. Damian is now on cat number three and I didn’t know Bruce could be such a push-over. We celebrated Alfred’s seventy-fifth birthday last month, Jason is coming around more often… Things are going pretty well.”

“I told you they would, Dickie,” Pop replied, squeezing him in a half-hug. A subtle weight on the small of Dick’s back turned them around. “Your parents would be so proud,” he continued, voice hoarse.

Dick swallowed the sudden lump in his throat. “Thanks pop…. Are you ok?” He asked. Pop chuckled deep in his throat, the sound like that of a cave’s groan.

“Should have known you’d notice…” He rasped. He looked away for a moment, deep-sunken gray eyes shadowed. 

“C’mon,” Dick cajoled, trying to disguise his worry. “Pop; spit it out. You know I won’t bite,” he breathed.

Haley let out a watery chuckle. “Listen, sweetheart, you know the elephant enclosure we like to keep in Naivasha and Moscow?” Dick nodded. There were certain places where Haley’s Circus stayed longer than others to let the animals recuperate from constant travel. Two such cities were Naivasha in Kenya and Moscow Russia, and thus the cities provided temporary stables and enclosures for the elephants. “Well, both places burned down a few months ago.”

Dick’s blood froze. “How?” he demanded. Pop shook his head.

“We don’t know. I suspect it was an accident so don’t get your hackles up, and its all paid for, courtesy of a donation from Wayne Enterprises,” he arched a brow at Dick knowingly. He smiled tremulously.

He knew, subconsciously, that Bruce and Tim still kept tabs on Haley’s financial status. It would destroy Dick if the circus had to shut down because of something so stupid as money. Yet it was moments like these when he knew they had his back, on and off the field. He exhaled a shaky breath.

“I’m glad, but pop, are you sure…?”

“Even though its been paid for,” Pop continued, nervously. “George and Inerva were in the stables when they went up. Broken bones, both of them, which means the knife throwers are out. We need income.”

“Pop, I don’t see what this…”

“I’m hiring a new family of acrobats. Permanent ones,” Pop blurted at last, with a helpless shrug and anxious eyes. “I already sent out the applications; and received hundreds of replies. By next year, I’ll have it narrowed down to two or three choices, and I… I want you to help me choose them, Dick.”

He felt as if the breath had been knocked from his lungs. If this were battle, Dick would have immediately disengaged and tried to find a way to attack the enemy from a distance. His heart throbbed, Pop’s words a sudden echo in his head.

_“A new family.”_

Haley’s Circus had hired other acrobats of course. Acrobatics sold a show in some cities where exotic animals and humans performing amazing feats were part of the every-day routine. However, the words new family rung in his mind, clanging like bells at the back of his mind. A new family. A _permanent_ family?

 _The world is moving on without them. Without me._ And Haley, who was the closest thing to a grandfather that he had, wanted him to help pick his replacement. Despite the hole suddenly in his gut, he understood that it had been over ten years, and he knew his parents would have wanted Haley’s to move on.

“I… I’m…” Dick shook his head. _Get it together Grayson_. “I understand, pop,” Haley scrubbed an anxious hand through his hair, eyes shining.

“Dickie, you know it kills me too…”

“I know,” Dick assured him past the sudden lump in his throat. “I know. I understand, I promise. Just… Give me a minute, ok?” he asked, only his extensive training allowing him not to double over as nausea made his stomach roil. “I’ll get back to you on whether I want to help choose them, but I think I just… Need a minute.” _Or a century. Preferably a century._

But who had that kind of time?

“This is so awesome! Hey buddy,” Jason whooped from atop Kira’s back. He leaned over the side of her hip, grinned at the baby who looked as if she were attempting to climb atop her mother with Jason, short trunk waving helplessly in his direction. Jason smiled, in the way he hadn’t since he was thirteen and some of Dick’s apprehension settled.

“At least he seems to be getting along with our girls there,” Pop observed. Dick nodded. Haley’s Circus had always, he’d held, been able to bring joy into the lives of broken and sad souls. It was the most fundamental piece of entertainment, to lighten loads otherwise too heavy. He had not exactly expected the circus’s charm to work on Jason, but he was glad something had.

“Yeah,” Dick agreed, shoving his hands into his pockets.

“It looks like you’ve made a family for yourself, sweetheart,” Pop continued, studying his face intently. Dick did not have to force the watery smile unto his mouth.

“You know what, pop? I think I have too.”

* * *

_March 2 nd, 4:35AM_

He dreamt of falling.

That wasn’t unusual. He had experienced some of his worst agonies and failures after the breathless terror of being pulled down. But this… It wasn’t like his usual dreams of the sensation, where he merely lost grip on a tightrope, on a cable line, on the hands of his loved ones, it was… Deeper. Darker.

He fell _into_ himself, the dark corners where Pop Haley towered over him like a monster, laughing with the Joker’s crooked grin. Where Batman and Two-Face and Zemo all swiveled together into one person, yanking him along on a dog leash one moment and drying his tears the next so quickly and without any rhyme so he was left constantly confused.

Where Babs was trapped in a building on fire, and instead of saving herself, she used all her cables to save children and he had to watch her burn from the ground, his screams of anguish silenced by her own. 

Where Talia came and took Damian away, then Jason, then Tim, and he found them all brainwashed, skin glowing with pit-soaked magic and they rushed him, waving weapons and Dick was forced to cut them down, one by one, sobbing as he destroyed the brothers he loved so much.

Where Alfred couldn’t take the stress of their lives anymore and flung himself from the roof of the manor.

Where Cas was snatched and held down in the basements of Arkham or maybe under the big top, her tongue slowly carved out and her large eyes dripping slow tears as she stared at him while he was one with the knife.

Where Steph pushed him out of the way of a speeding train, and he watched as she was flattened over and over again, her soft smile pitched into a gawping mess of shattered teeth and nose.

When he woke up, tears were streaming down his face.

Dick had never been huge on religion. He knew that Alfred prayed, and Bruce had studied the ideology of nearly every religious sect in the world, even admired a few, but didn’t subscribe to faith himself.

Barbara had spoken briefly of Taoism, and he knew Tim had tried being a Buddhist for a few weeks before accepting that they lived a bit too… violently for it. Jason may be something. Cas had only grinned when he’d asked her, pointing to the earth and sky before vanishing for another few days. Damian still prayed in Arabic, but his religion was either too private to mention or nonexistent.

His mother had prayed. What religion, he wasn’t sure, but he had a stark image of her falling to her knees and praying for their family’s safety and happiness. He had prayed a few times, though it wasn’t necessarily to a God or Goddess but to angels. People like his parents. Friends that had passed in the line of duty, League or BPD. He saw their faces. Begged them for comfort, mercy, strength, resilience.

He slipped from bed soundlessly; and wandered in the early light of dawn to his coffee machine. Nightmares weren’t uncommon but…

_Dick._

He swiveled, already sliding into defensive position because he _knew_ that voice. He knew it. It had been _years_ but…

_Dad?_

He scanned the darkness, heart pounding, every sense attuned to the air around him. Nothing. Dick relaxed partially. His security system was worth more than this entire building, Bruce had made sure of that. Even if anyone could sneak inside, Dick trusted his training and experience enough to sense them.

It wasn’t as if everyone could be Cassandra, after all.

He scrubbed his eyes. _The nightmares must have gotten to me_ , he supposed.

_Dick. Son._

He refused to turn this time. Dick shook his head and reached out blindly for his backpack on the bar stool beside him. He should have earphones somewhere. Maybe he just needed some music. Mozart or ACDC. Whichever sounded better. Then he could get another hour of rest before work…

_Dick. Look at me._

“Nope,” Dick said aloud. He ignored the tremble of his own voice. He was not afraid. He was Nightwing. He was Richard Grayson, Boy Wonder, acrobat, hero, survivor. The dark had no hold over him, and neither could the past. “Not tonight. I am so not doing this tonight.”

_Dick. Son, please…_

A flash of something solid in the corner of his eye. Dick exhaled a shaky breath, fumbled for his earphones quickly as the coffee tinkled into a mug. As soon as he felt them, he stuffed them into his ears and chose whatever song his fingers found first.

“I’ve been alone so long I feel like I’m on the run. Lover, come over, kick up the dust, I’ve got a secret starting to rust…”

_Dick._

“No,” he said again. “You’re dead. You’re both dead. A long time now.”

_Look at me, Dickie…._

“She said my spirit doesn’t move like it did before, she said that I don’t look like me no more, no more, I said I’m just tired, she said I’m just tryin, I said I saw you in the water.”

“Mama,” he whispered, to the apparition, angel, whatever. “Mama, please… Not tonight.”

The shadow vanished, as did the voices. Dick tried to grab the mug of coffee, but it spilled over his hand. He had been burned before but somehow this coffee seared. He flinched away, accidentally snatching the earphones from his ears to the new silence of his apartment.

Sunlight peaked inside the ratty curtains he’d gotten from Babs, burnt orange in color. It looked kinda like blood, the crimson trail left by his father’s spattered brain…

Dick fell to his knees and prayed.


	6. Feb 22nd & April 14th

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jason and Dick go out for milkshakes.   
> The bat-clan prepares for a rescue operation with high stakes.

February 22nd, 7:02PM

Dick had seen the impossible. He called Superman “Uncle Clark.” His best friend broke the sound barrier every two days or so. He also had to contend that he himself managed near impossible feats of acrobatics every night. However, staring at Jason slurping his milkshake through a straw and into his nose was giving him goosebumps. He shook his head. “That’s inhuman,” he gagged.

“The only good thing that came out of the Pit,” Jason bragged, crossing his arms over his chest smugly. He stared at Dick over the edge of his nose and shrugged. “I don’t feel pain as acutely anymore.” None of which explained how that was physically possible. Dick glanced around to see if the other few patrons had seen anything. They were being ignored, which was strange for them.

It had taken Dick traveling to Bludhaven; and dodging reporters for months before they had gotten the hint and left him alone in public. Granted, this was a small malt place in Crime Alley. It was possible these patrons were too poor to afford an internet connection or televisions. They probably had never even heard about Bruce Wayne’s sons.

It was kind of nice. Dick could just be… There.

“You’re using your nose to… Jason, that’s _literally_ inhuman. You can’t snort milkshake into your lungs,” Dick replied. He had been so mesmerized the first few moments of watching Jason that he’d neglected to point out how dangerously stupid it was to snort milkshake and what kind of siblings did he have, anyway? Jason was going to die. _Again._

“Calm down, dude,” Jason replied, rolling his eyes. “Don’t you know I’m a zombie?”

“Who needs to breathe, yeah.”

“You’re such a mom,” Jason scoffed, sounding almost exactly like Tim, and rolling his eyes like Tim too. How those two could get along if only they would stop hating each other. Popping the straw from his nose, he sat back, dabbing at the excess phlegm and shake with a napkin. Dick still considered himself reasonably horrified. “I think it’s because B didn’t love you enough.”

“He did his best, but it was kinda lacking,” Dick agreed, absent-mindedly. “Are you sure you don’t feel that?” He demanded. Jason leaned back, pushed the near empty glass of ice cream away with a smirk.

“Oh, no, you don’t get to do that! Wonder Boy admits that daddy bats is imperfect? Say it again. I want to record,” he dared, waving a spoon at Dick. He set his chin in his hands, glanced at Jason askance.

“You know B and I fought all the time,” he pointed out, somehow managing not to add that they still fighting now. It just so happened that having moved out made it so that their fights were shorter lived.

“Yeah, and when you argue with him, it just cements you in his mind as his favorite,” Jason snorted.

Dick had heard that argument from several of his siblings. He scowled. He’d have to talk to Bruce about it, because he certainly didn’t _feel_ like the favorite. In fact, he often felt as if Bruce expected more out of him than any of his proteges. He was the first Robin, the eldest, and Bruce had leaned on him hard these past few years.

“Let’s talk about you,” he decided, trying to steer clear of anything that might set Jason’s murderous rage alight. “You were having a right good time with those elephants.”

The hard lines around Jason’s eyes relaxed a bit. “Yeah, well, they were pretty cool, alright?” He said. Dick smiled.

“I think so too. I knew Kira’s mother, Sheila. It’s hard to think that this is her daughter…” How much time had passed, anyway? Dick tried not to think about his age too often, because then he would have to recall all the things he had done in his relatively short life; and start worrying about his mental health again.

“I like how you talk about her as if she’s a person,” Jason teased, though without his usual derision.

“You met her,” Dick pointed out with a smile. He sipped his own mocha shake, glanced back at Jason’s empty one. “How often do you eat, anyway?”

Jason glared. “What’d I say? Mom. That’s all you are.”

“I could send food, you know. Alfred still sends _me_ care packages,”

“That’s because you’re a loser,” Jason assured him. He tipped his head back, glaring at Dick over the tip of his nose, voice dipping into a dark vitriol. “I don’t want your food, Boy Wonder. I took care of myself fine before I became one of Bruce’s charity cases. I’m taking care of myself now just fine…”

“Whoa, Jason,” Dick interrupted his rant, raising his hands pacifically. “Stand down, ok? I was just asking. I know you can take care of yourself. You’re just as sensitive as Damian.”

Jason huffed and sat back, arms crossed. “The demon brat? Bruce hasn’t shipped him to The Alps yet?” He growled. Dick wondered why everyone assumed Bruce would just… Abandon Damian. He hadn’t abandoned any of them. Not for long anyway.

Then something else occurred to him. He straightened in the smooth plastic seat. “Wait, he threatened to send you to The Alps too?”

Jason snorted through one nostril, like a freak. “Duh. It was either he’d take Robin or send me to The Alps,” the memory seemed to calm him. One side of Jason’s mouth twitched in a small smile. “Something about a secret society of masters that live up there. He said they wouldn’t let me eat anything but Duran-Duran and water. And I’d have to sleep in a freezing cave with spiders and rats,” he cocked his head. “I asked Talia about it. Doesn’t even exist.”

Dick choked on his next swallow. “W-what?” He spluttered, slamming a fist against his chest. “Are you joking me?! I totally believed him when I was a kid.”

Jason’s smile was slightly diabolical. “Sorry Dickie, but dad made up some story about a terrifying bootcamp just to scare us. Guess the boogieman wouldn’t have worked out so well, huh?”

He laughed. “No,” Dick agreed. “I guess not. Knowing you, you’d have built a spring trap beneath your bed, ready to catch him. It would have gone off as Alfred was dusting in there or something.”

“And you would have picked sunflowers and baked him cookies like he was Santa Claus or some shit,” that did kind of sound like something a young Dick Grayson would have done. Dick hid his laughter behind one hand as Jason continued cheerily. “Babs would have just laughed at Bruce until she peed herself.”

“Tim would have created an ingenious security system; and found out the truth less than ten hours later.”

“And The demon brat? Would have found the yeti and big foot and slaughtered them both.”

“Cas would just blink, pat B on the chest and leave his lame ass on the floor.”

By the end, they were both holding their stomachs, laughing uproariously. “Ah… Ah, J, come home. I need another older sibling to help me tease B and the others,” Dick pleaded.

“Call me and put me on speaker, then. At least I can hang up when Bruce starts his lecture.”

“You know he called me by my full name the other day.”

“He still remembers your full name?”

“Right? It was really flattering, actually.”

“You’re a really sad, pathetic person, aren’t you?”

“Didn’t you know? I’m an orphan.”

“Yeah, but you’re a cool orphan. You know elephants by their names and shit,” Dick chuckled.

“You’re pretty cool yourself, little brother.”

“I try.”

“I know,” Dick’s phone buzzed, and he glanced at the screen. It was from Oracle.

_Found another fear-gas factory in Blud. Sending you coordinates._

Man, he loved that woman. He pushed himself to his feet. “Well, I’ve got work to do. Walk me out?” Jason had already stood, and he gave Dick a strange look as if to ask: _why wouldn’t I_? He tried to hide his kindness behind a shrug.

“Whatever.”

It was a victory.

* * *

April 14th, 7:35PM

They listened to the recording in silence as the jet warmed up.

Settled into a semi-circle around the Bat-computer. At Dick’s last yell of warning, Babs covered her mouth, not in despair, but disgust. Her eyes, emerald green turned midnight black in the dim lighting, flashed. “He knows we would never just _abandon_ him,” she growled.

“He was screaming. They were _hurting_ him,” Damian pointed out, his expression behind the mask emotionless, but his fists were trembling at his sides. Jason laid a hand on his shoulder, to everyone’s shock. He narrowed his eyes at the computer.

“Anyone else worried about the fact that this guy seemed to know about our secret identities? Do….” Jason closed his eyes, and Bruce saw his Adam’s apple bob nervously. “I don’t even want to think it, but do you think Dick gave us up?” This question elicited various reactions from the assembly. A hissed breath from Cassandra, Barbara snorted aloud, Alfred’s lips pinched into a thin line, displeased. Tim swiveled on a heel to stare at Jason as if he had just turned into a parrot.

“Never!” He snapped at once. “Dick’s been doing this longer than _any_ of us. He would never tell the secret. Not for anything.”

Jason’s expression did not change, the hard flint of his eyes darkening further. “I’m sorry, did you not hear him screaming? Everyone has a breaking point, kid.”

“Not Grayson,” Damian argued, backing out from beneath Jason’s hand so he could stand beside Tim. Usually Bruce would be ecstatic anytime he and Tim could agree on anything, but now he only itched to board the plane and leave.

“Yes, even your _precious Grayson_ …”

“We don’t have time for this,” Bruce interrupted curtly. “Dick didn’t tell them. Of that I am certain. Now, for your assignments…”

Each of his children suddenly twirled in place. Bruce had often been on the receiving end of his own bat-glares, but never by so many of them at once. His jaw shut with an audible click.

Steph gave an exasperated sigh. “B, we’re coming with you,” she informed him. Bruce crossed his arms.

“The terms are that I go alone,” he pointed out, as gently as he could manage.

Jason scoffed. “Yeah, and we’re following the directions of a madman because? Look, Bruce,” he continued before Bruce could open his mouth to reply. “We don’t know if he meant Bruce Wayne or Batman and frankly, I don’t care,” Jason scoffed. “Whoever this person is, they managed to take Nightwing, League-prodigy and first protégé of Batman, without any of us knowing about it. You aren’t going anywhere without back-up.”

“Where _are_ we going?” Stephanie agreed before Bruce could argue.

Barbara checked the coordinates, scowling. “Amazon Rainforest. Brazil. At least three thousand miles from any human civilization,” she glanced at him askance. “Maybe we should call for help? People we trust. Diana. Clark. I’ll even take Oliver at this point….”

 _Not until Hell itself freezes over and swells with lava_. “No. Any stray from the instructions could mean Dick’s life. I’m not willing to negotiate this,” he scanned the room. “With _any_ of you,” he clarified.

“We’ll stow away,” Damian dared, setting his jaw. His icy blue eyes blazed, determination a liquid fire that was so Talia. And Dick. And Bruce. Damian was son of them all. “All of us. Even Todd. You aren’t the only one with access to planes!”

“Or a money empire,” Tim added. “You’re right B, this isn’t the time to argue, so _don’t argue with us._ These people are dangerous. They know our secret. They have our family. They _will_ be put down.”

“By all of us,” Stephanie added.

Cassandra stepped forward, the darkness of her mask like that of a crystal ball’s innards, swirling with mist and mystery. She took both of Bruce’s hands into her own, squeezed. “Together.” She said, and it was a command if he had ever heard one.

He looked to Alfred for help, but the older man merely smiled. His shoulders, usually so rounded and thin, gave a half shrug. “They _are_ your progeny, Master Bruce,” he murmured. Bruce sighed, squeezed Cassie’s hands quickly and pulled away.

“Fine; but follow my instructions. Exactly. This is not the time nor place to go rogue.”

“Yes sir,” they intoned in unison. Bruce pulled the mask over his face, glanced at Babs.

“We’ll be back, Barbara. With Dick.” Barbara gave him a watery smile.

“I have no doubt, Bat-clan. Be safe.”


	7. March 3rd & May 1st

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Damian's school is attacked and big brother Nightwing comes to the rescue. 
> 
> Jason confronts the man who murdered his family.

_March 3 rd, 3:18PM_

“Pops? Yeah, it’s me. Yeah… No, no, I’m doing fine,” Amy, sitting in the cubicle beside him, snorted. He slapped her shoulder playfully. “I’m fine. Listen, I called to tell you that… Yes. Yes, I’ll help you find new acrobats. Yeah. Yeah, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you, I just needed time to think. Yeah, I know, they’d be proud of you too…. Wait, Wait, I’ve got a call on the other line. Sorry, pop. Yeah, I love you too.”

He peered at the second caller ID, cocked a brow.

“Aren’t you supposed to be _in class_ , little brother? Or is it Spring Break for you guys? I never remember,” He quipped.

“Richard.”

He sat up quickly, the wavery tone of voice making a thrill run down his spine.

“Damian? Dami, what’s wrong?”

“Can,” Damian stopped, cleared his throat. “Can you come pick me up?”

“What?” Dick was already standing, grabbing his jacket where it hung on the back of his chair. Amy glanced up, brows furrowed. “Kiddo, where are you? What happened?”

“I am at school. The despicable place. There has been… An incident,” Dick paused mid-stride, forced himself to relax.

“Damian, you didn’t get into another fight at school, did you?” He asked cautiously. He didn’t think Damian would call him during his lunch break for that, but one could never tell.

“I did not!” Damian cried, indignance replacing the vulnerability in his voice. For some reason, it was calming. “I… There was a man. A psychopath. He came into our school with a gun and began shooting. There are…” a gulp. “Some casualties.”

Dick momentarily saw red. Who could walk into a school and murder _children?_

Amy appeared behind him. “Gotta go?” she asked. Dick nodded frantically.

“Damian, are you hurt?”

“Please Grayson,” Damian scoffed. “No. I was herded into a damnable closet with a teacher and other students. I had appropriate weaponry hidden in my clothes in case I needed to defend the innocent but the gunman… He never opened the door. But I didn’t stop him. I couldn’t, I… Richard, did I do the right thing? I tried to save as many as I could…”

“Yes,” Dick promised. “Damian, yes. I promise you, you did exactly what you were supposed to do. I’m on my way, ok? I’m on my way right now, and I’m going to pick you up. In the meantime, have you called Bruce?”

“Father?” Damian sounded surprised. “Oh. I had not. My phone was lost in the chaos. This is Commissioner Gordan’s phone. I called you first.”

Usually he would be flattered, but right now, he was just frantic. Enraged. Relieved. Heartbroken. Damian said there were casualties. Murders.

The death of children always hit him hard.

“Ok. Ok, Little D, here’s what’s gonna happen next,” he slipped into his car. “I am on my way _right now._ I’m going to come pick you up, ok? I know you don’t need it, but let the paramedics check you out. Stay close to Gordon. I’ll call Bruce. Was….” Dick clenched his teeth. “Was the gunman caught?”

“No,” Damian growled. “No. He is still at large.”

“Not for long. Hold position, little brother. I’m coming.”

“Understood,” then the line cut, as officially as a life snuffed out. It was an empty feeling. Dick exhaled a shuddering breath before typing a number into his phone with one hand. Bruce answered before the first ring had even ended.

“Dick!” Bruce cried at once. “Please tell me you’ve gotten ahold of Damian. There was a shooting at…”

“He’s fine, B. He just called me,” he heard Bruce’s audible sigh of relief. Shared the sentiment. If anything had happened… Dick dealt with death daily. He knew that Damian risked his life nearly every night for the greater good. He was a partner as much as a child, but to die in a random, _senseless_ act of violence…

He couldn’t imagine. “I’m on my way right now. He asked me to pick him up,” a beat of silence. Jealousy? Rage? Annoyance? Dick didn’t have time to unravel any of it. He blazed on. “Meanwhile, Dami said there are casualties. And the bastard is still at large,” now Bruce growled.

“I’ll have Tim start a fund for the victim’s families. Babs can monitor police progress and I’ll send Cas and Stephanie out there looking…”

“And Jason.”

“Jason?”

“If this asshole is on the run, where’s the perfect place to find fellow murderers to hide his neck?”

“Crime Alley. Good thinking,” Dick heard Bruce palpably swallow. “W-where are you taking Damian when you pick him up?”

“The manor. He needs his dogs right now, I think,” Dick sighed. “And I imagine you need to see him too.”

“You’re not wrong,” Bruce agreed gruffly. “I’ll have Alfred pick up his favorite foods. And yours. Can you convince Jason to eat dinner with us tonight? I think I need all my children safe and, in my eyesight, if only for an hour.”

It was rare to hear Bruce so candid, or to address them so familiarly. Dick swallowed a sudden lump in his throat. “I’ll do my best.”

“Thank you, chum,” Bruce replied, voice dripping with affection. They sat a moment, in the silence of hopes and fears and dreams and fights. “Dick. Get home safely, alright?”

He grinned. “You got it, B,” Bruce hung up as curtly as Damian. The two little bastards. Dick called Jason next.

He picked up on the second ring. “Damian hurt?” He asked immediately. Dick wasn’t surprised. He’d had a feeling that Jason was keeping tabs on the family. This just cemented that idea.

“Safe, if not shaken,” he answered. “But the gunman is still out there. We think he might try to hide in Crime Alley.”

“The fuck he will,” Jason cursed. “If he steps foot here, I’ll get him.”

“Thanks. Spoiler and Orphan will be joining you out in the field shortly. Oracle is in charge,” Jason grunted assent, recognizing the authority in Dick’s voice. It was a miracle he responded to it. Maybe Dick _was_ a miracle worker. “Oh, and I’m supposed to convince you to join us for dinner tonight.”

“The fuck you are.” Maybe not.

“Jason, please. This… This has really shaken up Bruce. He called us his kids.”

“I don’t care if he called me his _honey boo-boo bear._ I’m not coming if he’s going to be there.”

“Jay… Just for once, for _an hour,_ Jason, don’t let this be about you and Bruce, or Bruce and the Joker, or any of that. Let this be about the fact that our brother made it back in one piece.”

“You know Bruce is going to get you all killed one day, right?”

“Damn it, Jason!” he suddenly roared. “ _Not today!”_

The other line clicked silent, but to Dick it sounded like a thunderclap. He slammed a palm against the steering wheel. “Damn it, Jason!” he hissed at the empty line.

_Dick._

“No!” Dick raged. “You died. You fuckin died and _left me._ Bruce is my dad now. This is my family, and someone put it in danger.”

_Dick._

“I won’t just let it go. I’ll get justice, just like I did for you,” he continued, rage still kindled in his chest. “ _This_ is my family.” Saying it was accepting it, imperfections and all. He had done so before, but never with so much fury.

The shadow vanished like a scolded child.

* * *

_May 1 st, 2:23 AM_

Trapping interdimensional beings was _definitely_ a Justice League thing.

Holding them in secret prisons? Not so much. Jason was actually kinda impressed. He knew that once upon a time, Oliver Queen and Barry Allen had had secret prisons of their own, but since the formation of the League, those had been all but defunct. The people the League caught were usually placed in legitimate government institutions. It was probably a law. Tim would know.

This time, Superman had made an exception.

The walls; surrounded the thousand’s years old ice of Antarctica beneath The Cave of Solitude, were also reinforced with the strongest steel and soundproof glass The League could create. It would take entire alien armies to break out.

 _He deserves worse,_ Jason thought as the elevator clinked to a jerky stop. He stuffed his fingers, numb already, into his oversized pockets. He hadn’t told anyone where he was headed, but Alfred probably knew. That was why he had insisted Jason take the winter gear, a small but concerned smile as he swiped a strand of Jason’s hair.

_“Take care, Master Jason.”_

But he hadn’t tried to stop him. That was how Jason knew the guns stashed beneath his layers were real. They were right.

 _He_ was right this time. Some monsters needed to die.

“Hello Jason,” The monster greeted, when Jason approached the single cell. He was facing away, sitting hunched on an overturned bucket. His black cloak floated around him like a child’s blanket. It was hard to believe this was the person who’d nearly brought the entire Bat family to its knees, destroying Gotham in the mix. He looked so… Child-like.

Still, seeing him made a shiver wrack Jason’s spine.

He had watched this man plunge a knife into Tim’s throat, had woken up in horror to see Barbara toppled on her side, a bullet in her head. Jason had seen the wrecked pieces of soul in Bruce’s eyes, had seen his shoulders quake with tears he hadn’t known were possible.

His fingers itched for his guns, but he held them still. _I want to savor this,_ he thought. “How has it been, to have a family again? To be able to feel the warmth of their bodies? Hear their voices?”

Jason didn’t answer. There were no words to describe it.

The creature hummed contemplatively. “Do you know what I dream about, every night? I dream about what it would be like to hold them. To hear them laugh. Does he do that?” Now he turned, partially. Jason took a step back, heart thundering. “Does he hold you, hug you, tell you how much he loves you? _Does_ _he,_ Jason?”

Jason swallowed a sudden lump in his throat. Even leaving the manor for an hour was enough to send Bruce into a full-fledged panic attack. He was still half a man, despite the reunions. This monster had done that to Jason’s father.

His fists clenched at his sides. His finger trembled where it was about to fire, and he could hardly breathe suddenly. “Do you remember what I promised you, the night you broke into my home and slaughtered my family? Do you remember?”

The creature’s shoulders lifted, fell, in quick succession. Almost as if he were laughing. He was _laughing_ at Jason.

“I recall.”

“Well, I’m here now,” Jason pulled the gun out. “To fulfill that promise.”


	8. March 3rd

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Damian returns home more or less unscathed. A madman is on the loose in Gotham. Tim finds a link between the victims.

_March 3 rd, 3:55PM_

“Should I have fought?”

“Let’s go through it if you had,” Dick suggested instead of answering. “Had you fought, I have no doubt you would have disarmed him. Potentially wounded him, am I right?”

Damian shifted a bit in the passenger seat, his eyes on the road ahead with such unwavering persistence one would have assumed he was the one driving. “Yes,” his backpack was clutched against his chest like a shield, mouth pressed into a firm line. Most days, Damian danced the line between childish and mature with such precision Dick doubted his own age and experience.

But today? Today he looked like a child.

“Right, but how long might it have taken you? He would have fought back. I know people are already dead, but how many more might have died if a battle broke out?”

“Father has trained me to minimize civilian casualties while fighting.”

“As he trained us all. You also know in small spaces -or with unstable targets – that isn’t always an option. In the BPD, we’re trained to try and negotiate before we go in guns blazing. It could cost more lives.”

“I felt like a coward!” Damian blurted, brows thundering. He clenched his teeth, held his backpack tighter. He was like a dormant volcano that had discovered it had the capacity to destroy and was preparing to fulfill that purpose. “Hiding like the others when I am… I am…”

“You were trained for this,” Dick finished. “I know the feeling. You think I don’t want to use all my skills whenever I come into a hostage situation? You think I wouldn’t have wanted to suit up had they called me in when this murderer showed up at your school? I’m tempted every day, Dami,” they arrived at the manor. Dick parked and shoved the car into park. Sighing, he turned to his little brother and carded a gentle hand through his hair.

For once, Damian let him.

“But this is the cost of having two lives, and what’s more, of swearing an oath in both of them. Who would have been saved had you intervened? Not only would you have exposed yourself, and our entire family, but you could have caused more fatalities.”

“Or I could have saved them all. You would have. Drake would have.”

“We might have tried. Whether we would have succeeded is another thing altogether,” he lowered his voice. “You can’t blame yourself for this, Dami. None of us blame you.”

“Father will be disappointed,” Damian whispered.

“I already spoke to Bruce. He was only relieved that you’re alive and ok. Everyone else too.”

“Tt.”

Dick plucked his chin. It would take awhile for Damian to believe his words. He knew this from experience, but right now, Damian had a family that was worried sick about him. “Let’s go,” he said. Damian hitched his back-pack over his shoulder and allowed himself to be guided inside.

* * *

_March 3 rd, Midnight_

“There were eleven deaths,” Barbara reported. “Two teachers. Nine children.”

“Wayne Industries had already extended help with funeral expenses,” Tim sighed. Dick nudged his shoulder with his own.

“I know,” Barbara adjusted her glasses on her face. “Still, check this out. I was looking at the reports and the school surveillance. It was knocked out right before the shooter walked in, and what’s more, the school registrar was hacked last week. Someone could see the names and personal info of every student at Gotham High for sixteen hours before the shooting happened. We don’t know who the shooter is, but these names follow a pattern…”

“So, this was planned,” Dick growled, leaning over Bab’s shoulder. “What’s the pattern?”

Babs sighed so explosively a strand of hair flew away from her face. “The victims names are Daisy, Arnold, Michael, Isabella, Ameera, Neil, William, Abdel, Yancy, Nicko and Erin. All of the victims are of various races, backgrounds and socioeconomic statuses. But one thing they all have- had- was black hair, a second language and have classes with Damian.”

“Babs…” Dick breathed.

“The pattern,” Tim discerned, swallowing heavily. “Together they spell out Damian Wayne.”

* * *

_March 3 rd, 4:45 PM_

They entered the kitchen to find Alfred stress-cooking. “Master Damian,” he cried, his face relaxing exponentially as he beheld the youngest member of the house.

No sooner had he said it that Titus and Alfred the cat came bounding into the kitchen, and nearly knocked Damian off his feet with meows and aggressive tail wagging. The young boy knelt to embrace them for a full minute before standing, now seeming much calmer.

“Pennyworth,” Damian replied, with slightly less formality than usual. “Is that Baclava?” Dick tried to wrestle Titus from the kitchen, though Alfred’s eye had only twitched a little at their presence. Probably trying to save face for Damian.

“Yes. I am in the process of making it. Would you like to be my taste tester?” Damian looked up, as if seeking permission from him. Dick smiled and shrugged, trying to wrestle Titus out.

“You know I wouldn’t know what real Baclava tastes like.”

“True,” Damian supposed. “What about the shooter?”

“We’re working on that son,” Bruce piped up, coming from the hallway. His face softened when he beheld Damian. He came forward, took him by the shoulders. “I’m… Glad you’re safe, Damian,” he breathed.

Damian ducked his head, but the tips of his ears burned red. He shuffled in place, like a reed rustled by wind. “I… I feel I have failed you father. Failed Robin.”

“Ah, son,” Bruce breathed. “You did the right thing, the wise thing. And don’t think Jim didn’t tell me how you comforted the other children when they were afraid. I couldn’t be prouder of you,” Damian seemed to unwind at those words. His shoulders slumped and he exhaled slowly.

“I imagined you’d be sad to lose your only progeny should I perish.”

Bruce sighed. “I would have been sad. Who else would I have argued with?” Tim asked, striding into the room, Barbara rolling in behind him. She reached out to pat Damian on the shoulder, peering deep into his eyes as if trying to memorize his features.

When she locked eyes with Dick, she smiled sadly. _He’s ok,_ she mouthed. Dick gave a curt nod. _Love you_ , he mouthed back with all his heart.

“I did feel pity for you, Drake. I am a brother that only comes every few millennia,” Damian agreed. Tim rolled his eyes, but he was still smiling.

“Brat,” he accused. Damian smiled.

“Cute brat,” Steph cried, swooping into the room to press a kiss to Damian’s cheek. He recoiled with a noise of disgust, swiping at his cheeks as if he believed himself diseased.

“Brown!” He snapped. “I do not want your slobber!”

“Oh, but you’ll accept it from a dog? C’mon Titus! Have some mercy on Dickie,” Steph called. Titus perked up and instantly dashed from Dick’s hands toward Spoiler, sitting at her feet like a well-bred show dog.

Dick gawked. “Oh, come on!” 

Cassandra wandered into the room. She and Damian exchanged a nod. “Well, everyone prepare yourselves for dinner,” Alfred announced, clapping his hands together. “We’re having roasted duck with baked potato and a souffle on the side.”

“I haven’t had souffle in at least _ever_ , Alfie,” a final voice declared from the doorway. Dick could have fallen over such was his relief. Instead he merely closed his eyes and let his mouth quirk at the edges. The others all swiveled.

“Wait, what?” Tim spluttered. Cassandra shushed him with a hand on his arm.

Bruce stared at Jason as if he were a pearl at the bottom of the sea. “Jason…”

Said person held up a hand, stopping Bruce in his tracks. “Let’s not make today about you and me, huh?” A glance at Dick. “So far as I understand it, baby bird dodged a literal bullet and Alfred is making roast duck. All I needed to know,” he announced.

A long moment passed.

Cassie, bless her heart, knew how to break it. “Together,” she summarized. “Yes,” she took Damian and Jason’s hands and dragged them to the counter to help Alfred with Baclava. Tim looked visibly discomfited, but Stephanie challenged him to a game of Uno and they vanished into the dining room to play.

Babs followed them, winking at Dick as she went. Bruce started to pass him, no doubt on his way to the Cave, but Dick grabbed his sleeve. He didn’t say anything, just shook his head once. Bruce opened his mouth as if to argue, but something in Dick’s eyes must have prevented him.

He reached out to clasp Dick’s shoulder instead, pressed his lips against Dick’s temple. “You never cease to amaze me, Richard Grayson,” he murmured. Then he broke away to help Alfred marinate the duck.

Dick swiped away a tear. “This _is_ my family,” he repeated.


	9. March 3rd & April 15th

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cas and Jason have a moment late at night. The Bat-clan head to the Amazon for an impromptu and strange rescue. Dick is out-numbered during a wrestling match.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Take a read, drop a comment! Is this story making sense so far? Hitting any marks?

_March 3 rd, 11:57 PM_

She found him sitting outside Damian’s door that night.

He knew she was there, in the darkness silky as the nice dress Bruce had gotten her for Christmas. It was breathable, good for battle or relaxing. She hadn’t worn it yet because it was so delicate that it scared her.

He looked so delicate it scared her.

“Hey Orphan,” Jason mumbled. She exited the shadows. He was leaning against the door, one hand set against it as if he were contemplating pushing it open. The other hand he used to rub the back of his neck, like Bruce did when his skin was blooming black from battle.

She did not answer, only approached him slowly. He was not dangerous to her. More like a grasshopper, powerful and quick, but forever in flight. She wished he would settle. She knew he couldn’t. Not yet. She also was not the settling type.

“Alfred offered me a new room. Not my old one. A new one. But I can’t sleep. The manor still smells the same, sounds the same at night, when most everyone is out saving Gotham. It reminds me of…” Jason sighed. Cassandra crept closer, slipped a hand against the door, right beneath the one he had there.

The wood had a heartbeat. Fluttering like a hummingbird, light and fast. She still loved him.

She did not have the words for that though, so she merely stood there in the shadow of this grasshopper from the dead, fleeting as wind and pained as a throbbing heart. “It reminds me I am lost,” Jason finished.

“So I guess I came here, to remind myself that somewhere in this world… There are kids who aren’t gone yet. Not like me. Kids like him,” he jerked his head to the inside. “Bruce is going to get you all killed. With his arrogance and self-righteousness, y’know? All of you are too loyal to see it. He’s gotten lucky so far. He’s only lost one. Only lost me, and what was I worth anyway?” A bitter laugh.

Cassandra inched her hand upwards until her fingers covered his. He did not pull away. “You came,” she muttered.

“Dick can talk anyone into anything.”

“ _You_ came,” she repeated, frustrated. Her fingers tightened, a band. “First time, the house…” she struggled for words. “We… Together,” she finally decided, curling her fingers deeper around his. “You bind our wounds.”

Jason snorted. “I _am_ the wound.”

“You came. You bound our wounds. You go now. Come back again.”

Jason straightened. Their fingers remained interlocked. Jason brought her hand to his lips, pressed a kiss there gentle as the wind. “Keep an eye on them for me, Cas,” he asked. Cassie swung their hand between them, in a sort of shake.

“I do,” she agreed. “Come back again.”

“We’ll see,” he drifted away from the door with the grace of a grasshopper, but his scent remained, a specter of wounds bound and healed.

* * *

April 15th, 1:23 AM

It had been years since one of his sons were kidnapped like this.

Whenever one of them went missing nowadays, it was usually with masks on and during League sponsored missions. They had a team to watch their backs. Advanced trackers and the knowledge of other heroes, with abilities that even Bruce himself could not emulate. In their capacities as Wayne heirs, however, there hadn’t been an overt kidnapping since Jason was fourteen, at least.

After Bruce had publicly announced that he was helping fund Batman and the Justice League, the villains had apparently seen the foolhardiness of kidnapping one of his heirs. After all, who wanted Superman to show up on their doorstep one day, and demand the safe return of his benefactor’s children? Hell, it was one of the reasons why Bruce had made the announcement.

As Batman, it was terrifying enough to hear that one of his proteges was missing, but as Bruce Wayne? The helplessness was ten-fold because they all had personas to keep, secrets that could undo years of work. 

He hated it, and so when the kidnappings had slowed down, Bruce had foolishly allowed himself to believe that he had made the right choice, telling the world he sponsored super-heroes. If anything, it kept his family safe.

He was an idiot.

 _But I won’t make the same mistake twice, Dick,_ he swore, yanking his gauntlets into place. He wiggled his fingers, testing the familiar flexibility of the leather. _I have an exigency plan for every eventuality. Right down to an attack by my own best friend, but I let hope blind me to planning this. It was arrogant. Foolish._

It had taken a moment of inner debate, but finally he decided to arrive as Batman. He could not verify that Dick hadn’t arrived as Nightwing. Even if his kidnappers suspected that Bruce Wayne was Batman, it made sense either way if Batman arrived, either as an ally of Bruce Wayne or as an ally of Nightwing. Either way, this was the safest way to keep his identity a secret _and_ protect his children.

The remainder of whom stood behind him in the empty loading bay of the Bat-plane. To his immediate left, Red Hood and Red Robin. To his right, Robin, Spoiler and Orphan. They stood as he had taught them, emulating the surreal silence and stillness of Gotham’s oldest gargoyles, expressions scoured of emotion.

“Approaching drop-zone,” Oracle reported quietly in his ear.

“Is everyone clear on the plan?” Batman demanded, hitching his thumbs into the safety line of the parachute on his back.

“Affirmative,” Damian murmured. Batman gave a single nod, knowing that his youngest spoke for them all. He glanced at the empty space to the left of Red Hood and Red Robin. Where his sixth should have been. A hard knot of determination clenched in his stomach.

 _Hold on, son_ , he thought. _We’re coming to bring you home._

“Bay doors opening,” Agent A declared. The belly of the plane peeped open with a low groan. Bruce narrowed his eyes against the flood of bright sunlight that filtered in as it lowered. Wind slapped his cheeks and chest, nearly strong enough to hoist him from his feet.

“Batman, you’re go for launch in three…. Two…”

“Godspeed everyone,” Alfred mumbled.

“One. Go!” Bruce sprang from the cockpit with a shout. For a moment, his world was nothing but the dizzying combination of screeching wind and vivid blues, greens and purples as he spun toward the forest below. Then he straightened; and yanked on the parachute.

It tightened around his chest as the air caught, hammering the breath from his lungs. “Ok, the comm signal won’t last long underground,” Oracle began as he drifted to the ground. He searched the canopy of trees intently. It wouldn’t be the first time he parachuted into an ambush. “I’ll try to keep an eye on you using geo-thermal tracking, but these cave systems are notoriously under-studied,” a huff of annoyance.

“I have no clue how our systems will react. According to my calculations, Nightwing is approximately 376 feet below sea level. Deep part of the caves. You’ll need to find your way down them.” Batman grunted as his feet tangled with the branches of the trees. A few butterflies, disturbed, fluttered around his eyes and neck as nearby monkeys screeched and catapulted to new canopies. He waved the insects away impatiently, swinging himself into the lower branches.

“Straight down?” He asked.

“Looks like it. I can send the coordinates. What’s weird is that it is so deep, this part of the cave should be underwater,” she said. Batman landed on the ground, several hundred feet below where he had entered, with a small grunt as his knees shook from impact.

“Low tide?” He suggested.

“I guess so,” Barbara agreed, sounding unsure. Batman swiped a stray cricket from his shoulder, watched it hop away. It didn’t trigger any motion sensors so that was good. He glanced around, surrounded only by the dim shadows of the Amazonian floor. The trees ahead blocked most of the sunlight from reaching this part of the forest. It may as well be late afternoon instead of early morning.

“Just tell me where to go, Oracle,” he said. Barbara didn’t do well with uncertainty, a trait she had probably honed under his tutelage, if he wanted to be honest with himself. Especially if it concerned someone that she cared about, and it was no secret that Barbara Gordon cared for Dick Grayson very, very much.

“Ok, so you’re going to want to head a mile to the east. There you’ll find the entrance to the cave systems,” a beat of silence. “Red Robin and Robin have just landed five clicks south of your location and are holding position.”

_Good. For once they’re following directions._

Batman hadn’t studied the Amazon extensively, but he knew enough to realize that the creatures here traveled mainly by tree. It was safest, and faster. With that in mind, he fired a grappling hook to the nearest branch and swung along.

As he moved, Oracle filled his ear with updates. “Red Hood has just landed in the caves and is scouting ahead. As suspected, our gear is going fuzzy. I’m losing communication with him. Can you hear me, Hood?”

Silence. Then a sigh.

“I’ll take that as a no. Black Bat and Orphan have landed five clicks to your North and are also holding position. Status?”

“I’m here,” and _here_ was enormous. The cave entrance looked akin to a giant bee hive, gawping holes in the ground made of granite and million-year-old lava beds. Batman walked to the edge of one, surveyed the pure blackness of its interior. He tapped his left ear, activated his night-vision. “I’m about to go in.”

“Alright. I’ll send the others after you when I lose communication you too. Be safe,” she said. Batman nodded, tensed in preparation to jump into another unknown when a voice whispered inside his head. It sounded mysteriously like Dick.

“Oracle,” he called, softly in the humid Brazilian air.

“Yes?”

“Try not to worry. We’re going to bring him home.”

Barbara huffed a humorless laugh. “Try not to worry, he says. I’ll do my best, Bats. Get a move on,” there was nothing more Batman could say, so he jumped into the darkness.

* * *

_March 3 rd, 8:37 PM_

The dinner table had scarcely been cleared before the brothers were roughhousing. In Dick’s defense, it hadn’t even been his fault this time. Jason was being a brat. Damian was on the verge of smashing his head against a wall. Tim looked as if he were seriously considering reclaiming the Drake mantle and moving into his own mansion. Cas could kill them all. Steph was staying out of it.

Bruce abandoned shop after dinner. Alfred just arched a brow at the increasingly loud arguments Damian baited out of Jason and Barbara had gotten a call from the Birds of Prey like an actual superhero. It had seemed like a good idea at the time to challenge the three of them to a wrestling match. He was the eldest and most flexible. He’d known he wouldn’t win, but he hadn’t counted on them working _together_ to defeat him.

He would have at least established rules, like _no tickling_ , if that were the case. 

“Ah, ah, no, no don’t! BRUCE!” Dick hollered as his feet were mercilessly attacked by not one, but three of his siblings.

He tried curling into a ball, but Damian’s weight on the back of his thighs prevented him. The youngest Robin, with some encouragement from Tim, was squeezing the back of Dick’s knees with a savagery that bordered on malicious.

Tim and Jason, meanwhile, were perfectly content to torture Dick beneath his toes and along the arches of his extremely ticklish feet. “Stop!” Dick begged, thumping the ground with a frantic fist. “Please! I can’t t-take it! B-Bruce!” He wailed between giggles.

“So you see children,” Jason began, in his best educational voice. He adjusted his weight again, wrapping one strong arm around Dick’s calves and ankle while his other scribbled along the pads of his foot. “The mighty - _ugh,_ hold still birdbrain - must always fall. It’s the way of things, see.”

“I feel like there’s an entire religion based off that,” Tim contemplated, having less trouble since he’d decided just to sit on Dick’s ankle and poke at his toes.

“It’s called brotherhood,” Steph informed them, as she stepped over Dick’s flailing form to flop unto the couch next to Babs and Alfred. Barbara was now flipping through the channels, studiously ignoring her beloved’s calls for help.

“Guys! I-I-I’m g-gonna-ahhaha die!” Dick begged.

“And yet you’re still talking,” Tim pointed out dryly, with a savage tweak of his brother’s big toe. “Which tells us, big brother, that you’re gonna be fine.”

“Might die,” Cas contemplated, as she hopped over the back of the couch with a bowl of popcorn. She popped one in her mouth, cocked her head at her brothers, and shrugged. “Not immediately, though.”

“Bruce!”

“What is _happening_ in here?” Bruce asked as he entered with a stack of requested movies and a tray of wine. He arched a brow at the spectacle happening on his floor. Shrugged. Promptly stepped over the doggy pile. “Dick, stop messing with your brothers,” he scolded.

“Beheheeee! Save me!”

“I’m done adopting strays. Save yourself,” Bruce replied, mercilessly. He and Alfred clinked champagne glasses. “Also, you said my face looks like a butt. I said you’d get what was coming to you.”

“Come ahaha! Onnnnnn! Behehee!”

“What movie are we watching?” Bruce continued.


	10. April 15th & March 2nd

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Rescue of Nightwing continues, and goes from bad to worse. 
> 
> In the past, Dick's date-night is uncannily interrupted.

_April 15 th, 1:45 AM_

Finding his way through the cave system took longer than Batman would have liked. At every turn, his mind echoed with the kidnapper’s threat. He only had six hours to find Nightwing.

_“Get here within the next six hours, Batman. Bruce. Whatever you go by this time. Or your first Robin dies.”_

Batman had no doubt the kidnappers would carry out their threat, but how had they deduced Dick’s true identity? Or, for that matter, how had they captured him _at all_? Had they unmasked him? And if they had, who could have pieced together the fact that Dick Grayson was the first Robin?

_Whatever you go by this time. What does that even **mean?** _

Was this some sort of inter-dimensional bounty hunter? He’d heard rumors about them from the Lanterns. Beings that were somehow able to travel between the realities, ending the lives of a few who could change the history of a planet irrevocably. Barry had a bet with Oliver that somewhere, in another universe, a bounty hunter had murdered Hitler. Debates had begun as to what such a world would look like, but that was just idle speculation. Nothing but entertainment between missions.

Wasn’t it?

He met up with Red Hood a mere hour before their time expired. His second child was kneeling in a narrow tunnel, some three hundred feet below ground. The eerie blue glow of his eyes told Batman his night-vision had also come in handy. Red Hood’s jaw clenched as Batman carefully scaled down to his side, fingers knuckled into the few handholds of the cave’s rocks.

“Bout time,” Red Hood snapped, when he arrived.

Batman ignored his insolence. They were running out of time. “Did you find him?”

“D’you think I’d be sitting here otherwise? I hate this stupid plan. They haven’t stopped torturing him since I got here, and that was little under an hour ago,” Red Hood snapped. Batman tensed.

“Where?” He growled.

Red Hood gestured down with a vague wave of the hand. “We’re above them now. There’s an empty cavern just below us, big as the mansion, I swear. There’s only two of them, masked. I could have taken them.”

“And Nightwing?” Red Hood shook his head.

“Unmasked,” he reported gravely. “Looks like he’s been here awhile. I doubt he’s going to be able to walk.” Batman was about to demand just how Jason knew that when suddenly the wind howled through the cave, shrieking. Red Hood growled, and Batman realized it hadn’t been the wind.

_Dick._

Batman was moving before the scream cut short with a choked sob. “Stay here,” he ordered Red Hood. “Wait for the others. Attack on my signal.”

Red Hood stared at him. “Are you insane? Didn’t you just hear him screaming?” He hissed. “I’m coming with you!”

“Red Hood!” He snapped. He didn’t say anything more, but he knew Jason heard the veiled order in his voice, alongside the subtle message of desperation.

_If your arguing with me costs his life, I will never forgive you._

Red Hood settled back into his hiding spot with a huff. “Fine. Make it quick. I’m ready to bash some heads.”

For once, he agreed with Hood’s vow of violence. “Copy that.”

He backed out of the cubby; and was crawling back into the main tunnel when the air broke again. This time, garbled by the scream were words. “No! Stop! Dad, _please!”_ Batman’s blood froze.

Without thinking, he was shooting a grappling hook into the unsteady rocks above, and willed himself to really, truly _fly_ this time. That desperate plea wrenched all logic from his mind. His cape billowed around his ears, drowned out the sound of his own brisk demand. “Enough!” He bellowed, as his feet touched the ground.

His fingers scrabbled at the lenses over his eyes as sudden, piercing light blinded him. He recoiled, shut his night-vision off and turned back. His entrance was evidently no surprise. “Ah, there you are,” said a voice. Batman looked up. Across the cavern, two large lights were cast on a single axis point in the middle.

His eldest was suspended there, his wrists and ankles zip-tied to a metal bed stand. It was chillingly reminiscent of a crucifixion. True to Red Hood’s report, he had been unmasked, but Batman could still see the taters remains of his Nightwing costume dripping from his frame.

The blue robin splayed across his chest spattered with red streaks of blood. On either side of him stood a cloaked figure, robes the colors of purest night. One had a gnarled hand hovering just above Dick’s brow. It could have been a threat, or perhaps a caress. Either way, it set Batman’s teeth on edge.

He flipped out his batarangs with a growl. “Step away from Nightwing,” Batman ordered.

“So demanding,” the gnarled creature supposed, lowering his hand from Dick’s face. “Are you all like that?” 

Batman added another two knives to his hand, held them up in the light so that the kidnappers could see the small red beep of an explosive. “I won’t say it again.”

“You wouldn’t,” the other robed creature chortled. “You’d never risk harming your precious child, too. We’re a little too close to him, don’t you think?” He reached out for Nightwing, making the younger man flinch away with a whimper that sent a tremble down Batman’s spine

He narrowed his eyes. “Alright,” he called, tapping the disengage. He knew when his bluffs had been called out. The batarangs ceased blinking. He straightened. “What do you want?”

“Well, Bruce, I would start with calling off the rest of your team,” The shadow replied. His heart skipped a beat, but he managed to retain his calm.

“I came alone,” he argued. The shadow moved, imperceptibly and Bruce couldn’t quite pinpoint what exactly he moved. Whether it was an arm, a leg, his head or a limb at all, but a portion of his cloak lifted and the figure behind him set a hand on Dick’s temple.

Immediately, his eldest bucked as if he had been shocked. His neck muscles strained, as if he were struggling to turn his head away. He struggled against his bonds, crying out in agony. “No… Stop it, please… No!”

He gasped as his eyes snapped open. Batman could have cursed himself when he saw the opaque and misty pupils, frosted over with memories or thoughts beyond their physical reality. A telepath. Of course.

He’d seen the damage M’gann was able to inflict with her telepathic powers. Physical pain, Dick had been trained for since his earliest adolescence, but one could only withstand telepathic probing for an extended period. And judging from his wounds, he had been down here for a long time.

Psychic probing was also a very painful way to die. “No!” Batman yelled, lunging forward. “You’ll _kill_ him!”

“Halt,” the shadow ordered, boredily.

The hand was removed, and Dick slumped forward, panting. Batman’s eyes skimmed the area, searching for a way out. There was only one, so far as he could see, and it was above them, in the ceiling. The only way out was up, but he couldn’t get close to Dick without endangering him…

 _I guess I’m fighting from afar._ “Who are you?” Batman asked, raising his voice slightly so that Red Hood would know that _now was the time to be violent._ From above, a few spider carcasses and rocks descended, as if a mouse had skittered from its nest.

“You’re not as intelligent as the others,” the shadow perceived with a click of his tongue. “Pity. You could have had more time with them.”

Batman growled at the genuine sympathy in this creature’s voice while it tortured his son. “What does that _mean?”_

_Damn it, Hood, where are you?_

But the shadow turned away, to its partner. “Kal?” They inquired, with a wave of the hand. Batman inhaled sharply. It wasn’t as if there weren’t other men named Kal in the universe, but… The other cloaked figure suddenly vanished with a rush of air that stole his breath and Batman was sure.

He had only seen one man move that fast, and he knew for a fact that nothing short of extensive brainwashing and experimentation could make Clark hurt another person, much less Dick Grayson.

He swiveled back to the cloaked figure. So far as he could tell, they were alone, and close to his son or not, this was his chance. Batman broke into a sprint, headed right for the creature.

And promptly gasped when his feet were swept from beneath him. “Argh!” He cried as he was yanked upside down by one ankle, held suspended there. _That’s one of the oldest tricks in the book!_ A trap as ancient as the pyramids. Batman flicked a knife out to cut the line digging into the armor around his ankle, but it was plucked from the air before it ever reached the cable.

“You know what I found most fascinating about this?” The shadow inquired from below him. Batman lunged for him, but the creature danced out of his reach. He circled him, a shark swimming rings round its prey. “I am told that you do this again and again. In every version of yourself, you choose to protect that mask,” an accusing finger at his face.

“You choose to come dressed as the personification of the darkness within you rather than as a father. You choose to protect _Batman_ first and foremost over your own children! And I _know_ you love them,” he raged.

He lowered his voice, the gawping darkness in his hood like a cave of its own, or maybe a dark alleyway where worlds ended. “I know you do. I know that underneath this mask is a man who would fight every manner of monster for them, but you…” A dark chuckle. “You choose Batman. You _always_ choose _him.”_

“You aren’t from this Earth,” Batman deduced.

The shadow made a sound like one of Alfred’s more derisive snorts. “I don’t think of it like that. I think of it as I am from an Earth where the light is gone,” he turned away. “You’ll know its kind soon enough.” Batman took the opportunity. Hauling himself halfway up the rope, he quickly slashed through it and crashed to the ground in a tangle of cloak and limbs.

The shadow swiveled just as Batman swiped a leg beneath theirs. They crashed to the ground and he prepared to pounce when…

“You mother-fucker!”

 _What the hell?_ Batman looked up in time to see the cloaked figure return, flying, and dragging along several prone bodies.

His heart skipped a beat as Robin, Red Robin and spoiler were dumped before him like sacrificial offerings. He scrambled over to press a finger against Tim’s throat. A second later, Red Hood and Orphan dropped into the cavern from above, their eyes wide and cautious behind the mask. From Hood’s panting, he could guess they had already tried putting up a fight.

Bruce closed his eyes, straining for any sign of life beneath his fingers… There. A beat, quick but true. He exhaled a breath of relief and did the same for Robin and Spoiler. They were all alive.

“Wanna go again, you fuckin psycho!?” Jason roared, flipping out twin pistols. Batman instinctively plastered himself in front of the prone heroes. He trusted Jason’s aim, but he knew from experience that even the best marksmen couldn’t control ricocheting bullets. 

“Such fire,” the shadow observed. “I remember that. I remember how much I loved that about you, Jason,” the pistols trembled, Jason instead swiveling to face the shadow.

“What did you just call me?” He demanded, voice low.

“Jason,” the shadow continued. “Jason Todd. Or did you hyphenate your name too? I couldn’t find that info.”

“Who _are you_?” Batman yelled.

“You’re so stupid,” the shadow accused. It turned. Lowered its hood, and Bruce recoiled at the face of his father. Thomas Wayne cocked his head, snorted.

“Ah, Brucie,” he breathed. “How far you’ve fallen.”

“YOU!” Jason suddenly bellowed. Pure fury passed across his face, and he started to charge. “I’m going to KILL you!”

* * *

March 2nd, 4:12 AM

Dismantling Scarecrow’s fear gas operation was akin to riding a bicycle. He had done it so many times before, in settings both the same and vastly different from this wharf on the bay of Bludhaven, that he didn’t recall much. It all blended into his large memory bank of people and places and night activities.

He did remember seeing the shadow again.

Like before, it hovered at the edge of the fight, like a haze that couldn’t be blown away. Even as he was handling scarecrow’s henchmen, he saw it there. Watching him. Whenever he would turn fully however, it would vanish.

Then there was the voice.

It was as if someone were yelling to him from miles away. Similarly, when he had been _just_ inside Miss Martian’s telepathic range, a miniscule _are you there?_ Echoing at him. Was it a new strain of the fear gas?

That would make sense.

Yet when he returned to his apartment and pricked his finger to find out, there was nothing. There were no abnormalities, no signs of hallucinogens. So either he was a clone of the real Dick Grayson or the shadow was real.

Dick was rather fond of the latter answer.

 _If it’s real, it can be found_ , he recalled Bruce telling him. _If you can find it, you can stop it._

His phone buzzed. Dick glanced at it, smiling at Barbara’s question.

_Bust go ok?_

What a cute couple they were, discussing drug busts and villain tracking like pros.

 _Fine,_ he typed back. _Fear toxin is on its way to Bludhaven Memorial to be neutralized._ He hesitated, considering telling Barbara that the mysterious shadow man was real. She would be pissed otherwise. However, admitting that he was seeing a mysterious figure may not have been the best idea over text, no matter how secure the line was. _Have dinner with me tomorrow?_

The answer was instantaneous. _Somewhere classy?_

_Nah. Paparazzi would never leave us alone. My place?_

_Your place. It’s a date._ _😊_

He grinned, and wondered how it was after all these years, Babs could still make his heart flutter. He never got an answer, or to go out on a date with her.

The next day, Damian’s school was attacked.


	11. March 4th

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dick sees a dearly departed face.

_March 4 th, 11:15PM_

The Bats canvassed the city.

Each of them a pinky finger compared to the limbs the GCPD sent out, dogs barking long into the night. Still, they ducked into the darkened corners and misty abandoned buildings of Gotham, the places where innocent people are always slain in broad daylight, much less complete darkness.

They each had their contacts. Criminals. Ex-criminals. Assassins. Doctors. Wardens. The homeless. The pick-pockets. The businessmen. The crooked, the indifferent, the innocent. Through these people they sent out a single message, letting it reverberate and spill across the city.

_The bats want the child-killer._

After the fourth night, Nightwing had people approaching him, including a ten-year-old boy, scruffy and barefoot. He emerged from the shadows like an alley cat, brushed past Nightwing with the quickness of a pickpocket to tug at his hand.

Dick looked down. The children were almost never afraid of the Bat-clan. Whatever fear they inspired in others was wasted on the young and downtrodden. To Gotham’s _truly_ innocent and poor, they were nothing more than angels dressed in dark clothes. He knelt to listen to the child.

“Heard the Bats are lookin for the shooter. The child-killin shadow man,” the boy whispered into his ear.

He nodded _._ “Have you seen him?”

“Don’t know what he looks like,” the boy replied, with a half-shrug. Which was their ultimate problem. No one had a concrete idea of what the gunman had looked like. They knew from witness reports that he had been tall, cloaked. They insisted a man’s body, but the cloak meant that it could have easily been a woman. “But there was a man, in the pawn shop on 70th, who sold a gun with fresh blood on it.”

“When?”

“The day the shoot happened. He was wearin dark clothes. Smelled bad. I couldn’t get anything out of his pockets,” the boy pouted, as if this were a personal affront to him. Nightwing smiled a little. “He pushed me down when I tried.”

“When he left the pawn shop, which way did he go?”

The boy pointed East, toward the wharfs. “Thata way!”

 _Why go to the coast?_ Nightwing wondered. He looked down, pulled out a small wad of his emergency cash and pressed it into the boy’s hand. Sometimes, there were benefits to Bruce’s endless wealth. He smiled at the pure joy that flitted across the boy’s face. “You know the drill. Keep it hidden. Don’t go showing it off to your friends. Now, what are you gonna spend it on?” He asked quietly.

“I’m gonna buy myself pancakes for breakfast!” The boy cried happily, snatching at the money. Nightwing held it above his head.

“And?” He pressed.

The boy thought a moment, brightened further. He clenched his cut toes excitedly. “New shoes and a heater.”

_“And?”_

“Books.”

“Because?”

A tiny smile. “Because I’m not gonna be homeless forever. I _know,_ Nightwing. You tell everyone this,” Nightwing grinned. This was by far his favorite part of the job. He squeezed the money into the boy’s hand and stood.

“Stay outta trouble, kid,” he agreed, shooting his grapple into the sky. There was a sharp intake of breath from behind him, but otherwise the child only vanished back into the shadows, a hundred bucks richer than before.

He pressed a finger to his ear-comm. “I’ve got something. Kid saw a cloaked figure sell a bloodied gun to a pawnshop on 80th, then head East, toward the coast.”

“Red Robin, get to that pawn shop and find the gun. The rest of you, search the coast. I want every building cleared from here to 185th tonight.”

A series of mumbled affirmatives followed. The coast was only a few blocks away. Nightwing launched himself onto the opposite roof, mind spinning.

Even the ex-criminals seemed eager to watch this child-killer brought to justice. It was a strange psychology, as if the murderers, rapists, drug-dealers and robbers weren’t, in their own way, child-killers. Yet this shadowed shooter sparked the interest and disgust of everyone.

The bats may have been canvassing the city, but the city was also searching its own innards for a madman. He wished it could happen more often, but…

_Dick._

He inhaled sharply, fumbling mid-run so that he had to roll upright again. Nightwing swirled around because this time _he_ was sure. He knew his own father’s voice. A second later, his Escrima sticks were in hand, the tips emitting a low buzz as he swirled them around.

“You gonna come out and dance?” he called softly.

_Dick._

“That’s not a nice name to call someone,” the voice hesitated, as if thrown off guard by the casualness in his voice. Nightwing swiveled on a heel slowly. To his left were nothing but taller buildings, dilapidated rooftops. To his right were departments stores with tiles that would make him slip if he landed on them wrong. Alleyways that haunted Bruce’s nightmares.

And… He was alone. Great. He was legitimately going crazy. Like, for real this time.

_You always did have a sense of humor._

“So, you’re in my head, because no one is here, but you’re… what? A ghost? Didn’t know any haunted hospitals were nearby.”

_Dick. Look at me._

_“Where_ are you?”

“Here, Dickie.” It was only years of training that prevented him from shrieking when a very solid finger tapped him on the shoulder. Nightwing turned, Escrima sticks screaming… and Stopped. His heart just stopped.

That was his father.

John Grayson. Dressed in a pair of brown slacks with an orange shirt and rainbow tie. It was casual and collected and fun, like his father. There were details Dick had forgotten. Like the laugh lines around his eyes and mouth. The way he had his hair slicked away from his face. The tiny splotches on his forehead where he had messed up the stage make-up.

Dick couldn’t breathe.

Then he was striking out, faster than he had since he’d hit a growth-spurt at the age of twelve. The ghost dodged his punch, held his hands up with an expression of such sorrow that it made Dick’s knees buckle.

“Who are you?” He snarled, heart thumping. A thousand possibilities ran through his head. Had he been drugged without knowing it? Or maybe this was a kind of trick. Magical, alien, the list could go on for miles.

But none of those answered how he saw _his father_ right now.

 _There’s something more to this case. Something deeper and bigger_. He twisted into a roundhouse kick, trying to catch the apparition off-guard. His kick was dodged, his father back-peddling away, his hands held up pacifically.

“Dick. It’s me!”

“Stop calling me that!” He barked. “I. Don’t. Know. You!” The last word was accentuated with a final punch to its face. One which was caught in large, calloused hands that felt just as warm and hardened as he remembered. Dick stopped, a sob coiling in his chest. He looked up into crystal blue eyes.

“Dickie,” it whispered, gently rubbing a thumb over his gloved knuckles. “My son.” A jolt went through Dick as his knees crumpled from beneath him. 

“D-dad?” He whispered past the blood roaring in his ears. “ _Dad?”_

His father smiled, grabbed his hand in both of his so he could squeeze it. “Hello son. My sweet son.”

“How? H-how is this…?” Dick shook his head. “This isn’t real. I-I’m hallucinating. You’re gone. I _saw_ you fall…” A painful sob ripped from his chest. The hallucination-ghost-shadow-whatever knelt beside him, placed a heavy hand on his shoulder.

“I’m here, son.” Dick squeezed his eyes closed.

_This isn’t real. This isn’t…_

“Dickie; listen to me. We don’t have much time. They’re in danger. Your whole family is in danger.”

“W-what?” He choked, eyes snapping open. “Dad, I don’t understand…”

“You must give yourself up,” his father continued, urgently. “Whatever they say to do, you do it son. Or else you could lose everything all over again. You don’t want that, do you, Dickie? You don’t want to lose everything, do you?”

“I don’t... You’re not my father,” Dick stumbled to his feet, grabbed at his Escrima sticks but his palms were shaking too hard, he couldn’t get a grip, and this wasn’t real, was it? It couldn’t be real.

“Dick. Look at me,” the hallucination-dream-ghost-whatever pleaded. “Who else could I be, son? Please. Your family is in danger and I don’t want to see you hurt again.”

“Danger from _whom_?”

“You have to give yourself up. It’s the only way.”

“Dad…”

“Nightwing!” And _now_ Dick jumped, Batman’s harsh voice like a whip. He flinched. The father-ghost-hallucination-dream cocked his head, frowned a bit in the way he had when there was something off about the trapeze ropes.

“Dick…”

“Nightwing. Where are you?”

“Listen to me. They’re in danger.”

“ _Answer me,_ Nightwing!”

“Give yourself up. Come with me. Then they’ll be safe. I _promise_. You just have to come with me, baby…”

“ _Nightwing!”_

Heart pounding, eyes locked with those of his father, Dick pressed his trembling fingers to the earpiece. “I hear you, B. I’m on my way. I-I got caught up with something, I’m sorry.”

“You good, ‘Wing?” Red Robin asked. “You sound funny.”

“Don’t tell them yet,” his father-dream begged, looking as distraught as Dick felt. “They’re in danger, son. Why won’t you listen to me? I’m trying to _protect_ you, Dickie.”

 _I can’t do this right now_. Momentarily disregarding every lesson Bruce had ever taught him about turning his back on a potential threat, he turned around. “I’m fine. Anything?”

“I found the gun that did it. Eleven bullets gone. Exact type for the injuries and deaths. The coast?”

“Clean, but there’s an entire warehouse of illegal ammunition here. Enough to attack seven hundred schools,” Dick pinched the bridge of his nose to still the throbbing behind his temples. Of course, some weirdo in Gotham had the ammunition needed to destroy seven hundred schools, because Gotham would be the place where someone just _had_ that.

“I told you. Danger!” His father continued from behind him.

“Meet back at the Cave,” Batman ordered. “We need to compare notes.”

“Copy that.”

Dick inhaled a deep breath and peered over his shoulder. There was nothing there but smog-riddled Gotham air. He felt tears sting his eyes.

“Dad,” he whispered, as a tear trickled down his face. “Daddy, come back.”


	12. April 15th & March 9th

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The cave rescue in South America takes a drastic turn for the weird. 
> 
> Months earlier, Steph is kidnapped and Jason has to make a choice about who he wants to be now.

_April 15 th, 4:25 AM_

“Red Hood!”

Batman cried out, whether in reprimand or fear, he didn’t know. A piece of him surged from his body, protective, a desperate boy’s pleading fingers tangled in his father’s Armani suit.

_“Wake up. Please, daddy, wake up.”_

The other half of him wanted to grab Jason and Cassie, all his children and press them deep into his chest. Bruce cursed himself for being such a fool. “Hood, wait!” But Jason was already shooting, roaring as he charged for Thomas

“I’ll kill you, you green-faced freak! _Stop laughing_ at me!” _Ah._

Batman inhaled a sharp breath as the truth sprang out at him.

_I am such **an idiot.**_

He looked around. “Orphan!” He snapped. She did not look up, only cocked her head, listening. “Get the others to safety!”

“Not so fast!” The other yelled, stepping forward. He started to reach out, and before Bruce could even inhale a deep breath, prepared to throw himself at this new assailant, Cassandra was moving.

Graceful as the dancer she was, she latched onto the monster’s back and tugged. They both fell in a scramble of limbs, the Kryptonian screaming as Cassandra plunged something into his hip.

Bruce recognized a kryptonite laced dagger and grinned. He had insisted, despite much protesting, that each of his children carry Kryptonite. He was glad his paranoia had paid off this time. _I trust she can handle herself. Now for Jason…_

…Who had run out of bullets, apparently. He and the shadow were playing a game of cat-and-mouse, sprinting after one another. The shadow had dodged Hood so far; and was now circling Jason tauntingly. “So good, birdie!” He cackled, and now Bruce saw it. A flash of the pointy chin, the wide, red-streaked eyes.

Hood roared and lunged, grabbing the shadow around the waist, a slew of incoherent shrieks coming from his mouth. They rolled on the ground, Hood jabbing with expert precision at the shadow’s face. “I swear I’m gonna kill you!!!” He screamed. Bruce heard the knife unsheathed before he saw it glint above Jason’s back.

Not again.

“Hood!” He cried, lunging. He tackled Jason around the waist, and they rolled, flipping head over heels away from the monster.

“Get off me, Batman! I’m gonna kill him this time!” Jason yelled, struggling in his grip before they had even come to a full stop. He lashed out, nearly landing a harsh elbow against Bruce’s nose.

“It isn’t real! We all see different people, but he isn’t…!”

“Oh, I’m real,” the creature corrected, swiping at the blood trickling down his chin. “Very real. So is my mission. Which ends today. Tomorrow, I can go home.”

“The only place you’re going is the….” Suddenly, Jason went stiff, eyes wide. Bruce loosened his grip. “Sheila?” He gasped.

Bruce looked up, and gasped when he suddenly saw Talia Al-Ghul staring back at him, a pert smile on her face. She settled her weight on one leg, making her broad hips seem even more prominent and _why_ did he notice something like that right now? “Hello, my loves,” she replied.

“Holy mother of… B, do you see…?” Jason gasped, tugging at his sleeve. Bruce shook his head, gently maneuvered Jason off of him.

“I see Talia. You see Sheila. Dick saw his father,” he explained as he stood. He pointed at Talia’s doppelganger. “You’re a mirage, a shadow that changes faces. So, who are you truly?”

“Once,” Talia replied, with infinite sadness. “I was a father,” their eyes flashed.

“Bad at it,” Cassie deduced, with Tim’s dryness, as she flung the Kryptonian at Talia’s feet. Bruce glanced over as Orphan joined them. She had suffered in the fight. Her mask had been ripped around her right eye and chin, exposing the bruised flesh beneath.

She was also limping, one hand wrapped around her ribs. The mirage stared down at their ally, evidently disappointed, and sighed.

“Let me guess,” Batman interrupted. “You’re from another Earth, and on your Earth, Clark Kent had super strength, speed, flight _and_ telepathy? That’s how we saw you as something else. He was manipulating our minds as we speak.”

“Well, not _anymore_ ,” the shadow groaned, as their face began to morph. Batman narrowed his eyes. Inhaled a sharp breath when his own reflection greeted him. “Surprised?” His doppelganger inquired.

“Take a guess, dumbass,” Red Hood snapped. “What kinda sick game are you playing at here?”

“The sickest game of them all,” they sighed. “But it will give me my children back, so I play it.”

“Can you speak not-cryptic please?”

“Why are you here?” Batman demanded, over Red Hood’s impatience.

“Why? Why?” His doppelganger hissed, suddenly furious. “In my world, I wasn’t _selfish!”_ They hissed. “I stopped this, all of this,” he gestured first to Bruce, then the unconscious vigilantes on the ground. “When I found Dick. I gave up the mask, the hood, the mission for my children. All of them. I was a good father. I gave them a real life. You don’t deserve them!” he spat. Bruce flinched at the accusation.

He knew he didn’t.

But he would do anything to keep them anyway. He nudged Tim’s back with a toe, hoping to rouse him. It was time to _leave._ “That doesn’t explain why you’ve tortured Nightwing. Why you tried to draw us all here. What do you want with _us?”_ He growled.

“It’s a cycle. I’m here to play my part, so I can pass it along to the next. Guess who’s next, Bruce!” He leveled a finger right at him, and it somehow felt like damnation.

* * *

_March 9 th, 2:14PM_

Jason had just finished interrogating one of Granger’s clan when his phone dinged.

Technically, its pure existence while he was in mask went against everything that Bruce had ever taught him. If he was ever captured, not only could his secret identity be found, but the identities of everyone in his phone.

He had cited Bruce’s number in bold letters just for that reason.

Still, Jason had never actually had it ding while he was working. He didn’t have many people to contact or who contacted him anyway. Dick sent him weird texts every once in a while. Roy would at times call him in the dead of night, usually to rant about the state of Star City or tell him about fatherhood. Jason couldn’t even vocalize why he kept the phone on hand.

He glanced down at the hidden compartment on his hip, recalled that the last time he had been called, Damian’s school had been attacked. Maybe that was why he kept it near him, because if anything happened to one of them…

He found a secluded spot atop a crumpling building, the faint light of fires like stars. The homeless huddled below murmured quietly as they prepared to eat the few scraps they had assembled. Jason watched them, counting the children darting between adult legs with furrowed brows. 

“Kind of busy here, Dickface,” he quipped. “What now?”

“Not Dick,” the voice replied, darkly. Jason gave a start.

“How’d you even get this number?” He demanded, as a rush of fury made his face burn. He never would have answered had he known that it was the Replacement calling.

“No time for that,” Tim replied. He didn’t sound any happier that Jason had answered. “Listen, Steph called me. She was attacked and kidnapped hours ago, and she just woke up in an abandoned basement. Coordinates say it’s in Crime Alley…”

“And this is my problem because?” _And who managed to smuggle a kidnapped Bat into my territory?_ Jason clenched his teeth. It was impossible for him to know everyone who wandered into his territory, but this was just _ridiculous._

A sigh. “I’m on my way now, but could you please just… _Go get_ her? I know Steph. She doesn’t scare easily and… She sounded really freaked out,” Tim continued, in a rush of breath that signaled he was either biting his pride or driving in the roaring wind.

“Why haven’t you called Bruce? Or Dick?” Jason demanded. “Aren’t they your legal babysitters?”

“Bruce is at the office. I probably should call him,” Tim sounded thoughtful for a moment. “Dick is on a mission right now; and can’t come until later. Besides, you’re closest to her.”

Jason spluttered at that. “How do you know I’m not in… Kirgizstan, right now?”

“Because the tracker in your suit says you’re ten minutes from Steph’s location. Can you hurry, please?” Jason opened his mouth to continue, but the desperation in Tim’s voice halted him.

“It really kills you to have to ask me this, doesn’t it?” He asked, at last, eyes still on the fire below. He thought of how cold they would be when it inevitably tapered out, how dark the streets were this time of night. He thought of all the basements he had cleared out in this area, the mangled remains of young girls, addicts and the homeless stashed like nuts for the winter.

This was, after all, a fucked-up world.

“You have no idea,” Tim groaned. “Listen, I know you don’t like me, and I damn sure don’t like you, but if Dick is even right about you an iota, then you wouldn’t let an innocent person suffer. Not even to spite me or Bruce. So?” Tim’s demanded, harshly. “Was he right?”

“He’s an asshole,” Jason groused. “And an idiot. Text me the coordinates,” he hung up before Tim could see anything more, tried not to focus on how his heart slammed against his chest at those words.

_“You wouldn’t let an innocent person suffer.”_

_Was_ he that man? He knew he had moments of kindness, in the midst of his rage and fueled despair. He knew he hated the Bat-clan for everything they hadn’t done to save him or avenge him and what kind of family were they anyway?

He didn’t know. He didn’t know what kind of man he was.

But he did jump from the building, plucked the lighter from his back pocket and pressed it into the hand of an old woman sitting outside the circle. “To get it going again,” he said. She didn’t thank him because society owed it to her anyway. He was just the one giving the due, but she did pat his hand and smile.

His phone dinged again, with coordinates. No thank you, because perhaps he was only giving a debt already owed, a due automatic because they were kin in some way. In a batty way. The idea made him scoff; and take off at a dead run. He wasn’t running for Batgirl or Spoiler or whatever her name was, nor was he running for Tim.

He was running because maybe he didn’t know who he was, but he _wanted_ to be good. So he ran.


	13. March 11th & April 15th

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Barbara gets a disturbing late night call from Nightwing. 
> 
> Later, she has to sit and talk to Batman about feelings and pride. It goes about as well as it usually does.

_March 11 th, 4:18 AM_

It wasn’t at all strange for Barbara to receive phone calls in the dead of night.

There was a reason that Bruce had taught them to achieve REM sleep almost instantaneously. Any other way, and none of them would survive more than a month on their odd schedules, and practical no-sleep regime. 

Nevertheless, Barbara had also learned long ago that she had to establish breaks and boundaries, or else things got ugly. So at least once a week, she went underground. Oracle was officially off-duty for that entire day. For the most part, the heroes she knew respected that rule. They had similar ones after all.

Then some nights there was an emergency.

Barbara knew better than anyone that sometimes the world didn’t give a damn about someone’s mental health. Disasters were going to happen whether she welcomed them or not. So when her phone rang at 4am on her off-day, she didn’t hesitate to snatch it from her bedside table.

When she saw the caller ID, her stomach clenched. Dick was not known to break her off-duty rule unless it was serious. Like, bleeding out or on the verge of death serious.

Her phone didn’t get to ring a second time before she answered. “What happened?” She demanded.

“Babs… Hey,” Dick replied. He sounded groggy. Unfocused. Under his calm, there was a strained hysteria. “Sorry. I know it’s your night-off,” Barbara sat up on one elbow, already clicking the button next to her bed that would summon her wheelchair.

“No problem. What is it? Are you hurt? Where are you?” She switched to speaker phone, already flipping through her phone to the tracker app.

“What? No. I’m not hurt, I’m just… I think I’m exhausted. Or going insane. One of those options,” a nervous laugh that sounded a little too unhinged for her tastes. Barbara gulped.

“Dick. Listen to me. What happened? Have you inhaled fear gas or something?” She pressed. Dick grunted a negative.

“I’m fine, Babs,” he breathed. He sounded strained, as if he were trying to convince himself. Barbara’s mind ran, searching through Dick’s last known activity. Wasn’t he supposed to be with hunting through Bludhaven for the child-killer's weapons depot? Then, “or, maybe not fine so much. I… Listen, I just got off patrol and I’m staring at my dad right now.”

Barbara hesitated, stared at the blue blinking dot on her phone. Dick was at his safe house in Bludhaven, and according to the app, his vitals were strong, there was no sign of tampering or outward injury. Didn’t mean he _hadn’t_ inhaled fear gas.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean,” Dick stressed, in a tight voice. “That when I started patrol five hours ago, I kept seeing something in my peripheral vision. It was fuzzy, like when you’re underwater and something floats behind you, just out of sight? I ignored it, but then every time I turned, I saw a flash of something solid. It’s been following me all night. And literally, twenty minutes ago, it stepped out of the shadows when I tried to trap it in the light, and _it is my father_. John Grayson. He’s staring at me.”

Barbara inhaled a sharp breath. A hallucinogen. “Ok. I’m calling Bruce _right now.”_ She was already skimming through contacts, finger hovering above Bruce’s name when Dick cried out.

“No!” He snapped. “Don’t, Babs. Please. It- he- hasn’t hurt me. That’s how I know he isn’t real. It’s just… I think its exhaustion, ok? I just needed to say it aloud to confirm that its crazy. I mean, I know death is kind of a nonexistent thing for us since Jay got back, but… This _is_ nuts, isn’t it?” His voice cracked at the last word. Barbara slithered out of bed into her wheelchair, gnawed her bottom lip.

“Dick. Babe, listen to me, can you reach out and touch… it?” She asked, hesitantly.

“Nope,” Dick said, with certainty. “I’ve tried. I tried to shock him with my escrima and nothing happened.” Ok, that was weird. Barbara’s fingers flew through her contacts. Maybe this was psychological? Barbara had long held that a complete mental break down was in store for all the bats if they didn’t seek out help early. Dick hadn’t been to counseling since he was thirteen, and Dinah had forced him and his team to talk about the doomed-to-fail exercise.

“Has it said anything?” Dick hmm’ed, as if he could guess she thought he was crazy.

“Not this time,” a shiver racked up her spine.

“What do you mean, _this time_?”

“I haven’t slept well since Dami’s school was attacked, even using B’s tricks,” Dick continued, as if she hadn’t spoken. Barbara’s thumb wavered over Dinah’s phone number. Lack of sleep _was_ known to cause hallucinations… “That’s what it is, I think. Maybe I should take a break for a while.” _Hallelujah. If this is what it takes to make him rest maybe I should schedule him an appointment to see Dinah after all._

Barbara relaxed a bit. “Why don’t you come here?” She offered automatically. “We can re-watch _Star Wars_ …”

“It’s your night-off,” Dick protested.

“I’ll make an exception for you, boy wonder.”

She didn’t have to see him to know she had made him smile. “Thanks, Babs, but I think I need to get out of Gotham for a while,” she tensed again. “I’m going to Wally’s place for a few nights. You’ll cover for me with Bruce, won’t you?”

“Are you sure you don’t just want to _tell_ Bruce?”

“After what just happened with Damian and Steph? He would find a way to install a camera in my left earlobe. No.” _That’s not an entirely unlikely scenario._

“You want me to lie to the world’s greatest detective?”

“If you’d be so kind.”

She sat for a long minute, contemplating. It wouldn’t be the first time that she had covered for Dick with Bruce. They had made a habit of it back in their teen years, after all. However, the idea of lying to Bruce when Dick could potentially be compromised was different, and terrifying. _Then again, if I text Wally ahead of time and have him keep an eye out for me…_

“Ok,” she acquiesced. If there was anyone equipped to handle Dick Grayson at his worst, it was Wally West. She would just give him a heads up. “I’ll tell Bruce you ran away to the circus again,” Dick snorted.

“That’ll convince him. Thanks, Babs. I’m sorry that I…”

“Always call me,” she interrupted. “This sounds like a night that just purely sucked for you. Call me when you get to Wally’s ok?”

“Yes ma’am. Love you, Babs.”

“I love you too,” the line clicked away, and Barbara swallowed around a throat that felt as if she had just swallowed lead.

She brought up Wally’s number. _Hey. I’m worried about our fav moron. He’s coming to your place 2night. Keep an eye out?_

Ten minutes passed. Then. _Yeah, he just called. Sounded upset. Everything cool in Batville?_

Barbara considered her answer. Bruce was very territorial of Gotham in general. He disliked anyone from The League coming or knowing too much about the city unless it was for a very specific reason. Finally, she shook her head.

_Batville is cool. House of Wayne kinda struggling_ , she replied. _He probably just needs sleep and junk food. Or he’s been drugged. Verify pls._

Another twenty minutes. _Not drugged. In food coma now. I’ll take care of him._

Barbara exhaled a slow breath, sunk back into the familiar cushions of her bed. Her heart thumped in her chest, Dick’s unsure voice echoing in her ears. They had known each other since childhood, and in that time, she had never heard the usually passionate man so… Confused? Scared? Even Bruce’s supposed _“death,”_ had only inspired grief and a bone-deep tiredness. _I hope I made the right decision_ , she thought, even as she knew that it was out of her hands.

* * *

_April 15 th, 8:51AM_

“Your son is dying.”

Bruce sighed. He had prepared himself to face Alfred, Damian, even Tim. He hadn’t expected Barbara to leave Dick’s side for at least two days.

He turned away from the bat-computer, fingers entwined. Barbara sat across from him, her own face expressionless as she faced him with the same fearlessness as any of his progeny. Barbara wasn’t _his_ , necessarily.

At least not like the boys. Yet the pang he felt whenever he saw her in that chair, the moments of pride that flared in him whenever she was addressed, said a different story. Barbara could not inherit any of his fortune, and she certainly wasn’t a daughter figure, but if he had ever wanted a niece, Barbara could have taken that place.

“His vitals are stable,” he pointed out. He knew because the screen to his right was bright with Dick’s vitals. He could see his healing in real time.

It was slow-going.

“I didn’t just mean him,” she replied, factually. She tipped her glasses up, which was always a bad sign. Tipped glasses meant she was pissed. “But, if you must know, those charts won’t tell you everything.”

So, this was what he was facing today? Fine. Bruce slung a leg over his knee, rubbed the back of his neck. “Barbara…”

“He _flinched_ from you, Bruce,” it took years of training not to cringe at the memory. He would be the first to admit that he may not have been the most conventional parent. By the age of fifteen, Dick had seen more darkness than most fifty-year-olds.

Yet he had never, in all these years, flinched away from the man who had introduced him to that darkness. He had never been afraid of Bruce, even if he abhorred his anger or disappointment. Seeing that fear now... Bruce’s stomach churned. “He chews his lip whenever he’s awake. He hasn’t done that since he was thirteen, has he?” Barbara demanded. Bruce wouldn’t admit that he couldn’t recall.

“After incidents of extreme trauma, it’s normal for the brain too…” he began.

“Oh, so you admit it! You admit that he’s gone through something traumatic! How astute!” Barbara cried, throwing her hands up. Bruce felt as if he were arguing a completely different point. Then again, he often felt that way whenever going against Oracle. She was a brilliant tactician, and an even better orator.

He sighed heavily. “Why are you here, Barbara?”

“Because this isn’t a villain that you can outsmart alone, Bruce,” ah. So this was an old argument. As old as his friendship with Clark, as old as the mask itself. Many had pleaded with him on this very point. It was why he’d finally gotten partners, albeit not in a way anyone had wanted.

And look what happened.

One of them had died. Another was practically comatose. The others were traumatized, and he had an illegitimate son who was supposed to inherit the League of Assassins.

They would have been better off without him.

He almost said this aloud; but bit his tongue at the last second. “You think I should involve outside parties. Into Gotham City?” He inquired dryly.

Barbara rolled her eyes. “Yes, Bruce. Gotham City. Our home. Before any more of us are hunted down and hurt. They’ve already taken Dick, and twisted and tortured him to the point of collapse, or did you forget he was in a coma?”

Bruce glanced at Dick’s vitals again. Alive. He let the knowledge steady his voice as he stood. “This adversary is no different from the others that use psychological warfare. Dick _will_ recover. In the meantime, I can handle this.”

“No, you can’t! At least let me call in Clark.”

“He’s off-planet right now, and besides, what could he do?”

“Handle the Kryptonian!”

“I have Kryptonite for that. You’re letting your emotions rule you, Barbara.”

“At least I have some! Bruce,” Barbara exhaled a slow breath. “This monster has been stalking all of us for months. They staged the almost-deaths of _three_ of your children, all of whom have been extensively trained. You don’t notice, because you’re an idiot, but your troops are scared. They’re confused. Now is not the time to be proud!”

“This isn’t pride!” He snapped. “This monster is after you all because of me…”

“What else is new?” Barbara cried, flinging her hands up. Bruce cringed, recalled what his doppelganger had said _._

_“…In my world, I wasn’t selfish…. I gave up the mask, the hood, the mission for my children. All of them. I was a good father. I gave them a real life. You don’t deserve them.”_

Bruce, not for the first time, wondered what such a world might have looked like. In that reality, was there a Barbara Gordon confined to a wheelchair for the rest of her life? Was there a Tim, newly enrolled in college, blazing ahead with studies in engineering or forensic science?

What about Damian? Would he even exist, and if so, would Bruce have married Talia in that world, provided them both an existence free of the League’s mystery and violence? What about him, Alfred, Jason, Steph?

_What could have happened if I let Batman go?_

Bruce shook his head free of the speculation. He had seriously considered it in the course of the past decade. Especially after Jason, but each time, the mere thought of never feeling the coarseness of a cowl around his ears made him squirm. Besides, would any of his children even want to give up their masks now, after lifetimes spent being heroes? It wasn’t an easy life to discard.

But maybe that was why he should have left it behind. Because what was right was almost _never_ easy.

“I would die to protect you all, Barbara,” he suddenly blurted. Barbara blinked as if he had just smacked her, mouth opening and closing without sound. Bruce resisted the urge to twiddle his fingers. “You know that?”

“I know,” she agreed softly. “I never doubt that. But this doesn’t require your _life_ , it requires your ego,” a long sigh. “Just… Consider it, ok? Just someone from the League. Diana. Clark. Dinah. J’onn. Someone we know; and can trust,” she started to turn. “I’m going to sit with Dick awhile longer. You should come see him. Who knows? Maybe he just needs to hear your voice.”


	14. March 9th

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steph is captured. The kidnappers leave a message with her.

_March 9 th, 3:12PM_

“Mr. Wayne?” Bruce looked up, plastered a smile to hide his surprise. He had hired Marian almost two years earlier, and in that time, she had rarely ever spoken to him. She was more than competent at her work, and very afraid of Bruce.

“Hello Marian,” he said, as she fidgeted in his doorway.

“I’m sorry to bother you, sir,” she continued quickly, eyes darting over his shoulder. All of Gotham lay behind him, deep maroon sunlight filtering through smoggy clouds. It highlighted the dark spirals and towering buildings, making Gotham look like a smear of blood on black concrete.

_Maybe I am becoming a little morbid_ , he thought. “But you have a call from your Butler. He says its important.” Bruce scowled. Alfred rarely called him at work. Was it Damian? The League? Had something _else_ happened?

“Thank you, Marian. Line 2?” He asked, swirling toward his phone quickly. He was already answering before Marian could mumble a quick affirmative. She slipped out of the room with palpable relief. “Alfred?” He asked.

“Sir,” Alfred replied, and there was something hiding in his voice, just beneath the surface. “I’m afraid there’s been an incident with Miss Stephanie,” Bruce’s fingers clenched around the receiver.

“Do I need to come home?”

There was a beat of silence that scared him more than Alfred’s news. He heard murmuring in the background. “Alfred, what is it? Is that Tim?” he demanded. He had assumed Tim was in the office below him, working on taxes for Wayne Industries.

Alfred cleared his throat. “Apologies, sir. Yes, Master Timothy is home. Miss Stephanie called him first, it seems. She’s relatively unharmed, if a bit shaken. Perhaps it is a conversation best had in the manor,” Bruce shoved himself out of his chair, hand fumbling for his jacket.

“I’m on my way, Alfred,” he promised.

“Very good, sir,” Alfred replied, before the line clicked away. Bruce strode over to the door, flung it open just in time to see Lucius standing there. His eyebrows rose when he noticed Bruce.

“Something wrong?” he asked, worry sparking in his eyes. “I saw Tim _sprint_ out of here a few minutes ago.”

Bruce exhaled slowly. Recruiting the services of Lucius Fox was one of the best decisions that he had ever made. Yet there was a level of ignorance he preferred, if only so that if the day came, Lucius’s hands could be kept clean.

Then there were moments like these, when Bruce himself didn’t know what was happening. “Sorry Lucius,” he said, trying to fumble with the buttons of his jacket. “I’m not entirely sure what’s happening, but I have to head back. Will you handle…?”

“Everything?” Lucius interrupted, with a rueful but understanding smile. “Always, Bruce,” he stepped out of the way. “Good luck.”

Bruce slapped him on the shoulder as he stormed past. “You’re a good man, Lucius. Thank you!” he called over a shoulder. He fumbled for his phone, pressed the first number he had.

Barbara answered on the third ring. “Well, isn’t this a surprise?” She teased. “You called me first this time? To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Barbara, there was an emergency with Stephanie. Do you know what happened?” He demanded.

“What?” In the background, Barbara let out a curse and there was something like glass shattering. “No. I haven’t heard anything today….” She replied. A beat of silence passed, then, “Oh, wait, I see. She called me fifteen times today. Damn it. Is she alright?” 

“I think so. Alfred just called me. Said it was a conversation best had at the manor,” Bruce nodded to the security guard, already fumbling for his keys. “I had hoped you would know what happened.”

Barbara huffed with frustration. “I don’t. I was helping Artemis and Diana run interference with a covert-op that _still_ isn’t over. I haven’t looked up from my screen in days. Should I come, too?” Even if Barbara was better connected to the rest of the hero community, it was at moments like these when Bruce recalled that she was, first and foremost, a bat. He was proud to have been a piece of that.

“League business first,” he grunted, because someone had to keep an eye on the world while his city turned on its head. He trusted no one more than Barbara to do so. “’ll let you know if it’s that serious,” he promised.

“Copy that,” Barbara sighed, sounding reluctant. “If you don’t call within the hour, I’m going to hack one of your nice cars to come get me,” she warned, and if he had been a different man, he would have assumed she were bluffing. As it was, he knew how capable she was of doing whatever the hell she wanted.

His mouth quirked at the edges. “Understood.”

“Good… Oh, damn, I’ve gotta get back, B, Dinah is about to capture him. Keep me updated!” And then she hung up, without another word or waiting for a reply. Bruce sighed and flung the phone to the side, pressed harder on the gas.

First Damian and now this… His fingers twitched anxiously. Once he could dismiss, albeit suspiciously, as an accident, but twice? Two of his charges in the span of one week? He glanced back down at his phone, considered calling Clark or even Barry. He dismissed the thought as quickly as it had come.

He was not like Barbara. He didn’t _play_ well with others, especially when it came to _his_ family. It had always been this way for him. The manor’s gates rose to the right, noticeable even from the road and hidden behind an expanse of trees and field. Even to him, it appeared as a fortress.

It seemed more and more that his fortress was being invaded. He hated the feeling, He hated not being in control. His ability to cope with helplessness had died along with his parents. Bruce was typing in the manor’s code before the car had even pulled into the driveway, moving to open the door before it had even come to a stop.

* * *

The manor, while normally quiet just because of its vastness, seemed emptier than usual. The door creaked open when he rushed inside. “Al?” Bruce called. The Butler had only neglected to greet him at the door a few times in his life. His heart thudded in his ribs, and he stormed up the stairs two at a time.

“Alfred!?”

“We’re in here, B!” Tim called from Stephanie’s room. Technically, she didn’t have an official room in the manor, not like Tim and Damian did. She was a frequent visitor, and Alfred had a room always ready for her, but she preferred to stay in her own apartment in Gotham. Yet the pink ruffled lamp and incense signaled her frequent existence.

Stephanie was lying on a mound of pillows in the middle of the bed, a warm compress resting on her forehead. Her curly blonde locks matted behind her head. He couldn’t see any other injuries beneath the covers.

To her left, Tim sat beside her, his brows furrowed. Damian stood on the other side, arms crossed, and Jason hovered in the far corner, arms crossed and expression grave. Bruce briefly wondered why Jason was present; but shoved the knowledge aside to focus on Stephanie. She jumped when he came in, looked up past bangs that fell into her eyes.

“There he is,” she breathed. Her voice was deeper than usual, as if she had been screaming.

“What happened?” Bruce demanded.

Tim stood. “Sorry, B. I completely spaced on telling you anything before I left. Steph was kidnapped,” he explained. Bruce cocked a brow.

“By who?”

“We don’t know,” Damian growled.

“I don’t remember anything,” Stephanie elaborated, pushing herself further upright with a cringe. “The last thing I remember, I was walking to my next class at GCC. I heard someone call my name, and I… I swore it was my dad. Scared the hell outta me. Then… Nothing. I woke up in a basement, however long later,” Bruce scowled.

He had drilled stealth into them each with a ferocity that bordered on religious and while Stephanie hadn’t yet received the same experience as some of the others, anyone capable of taking Spoiler by surprise was well-trained, league of Assassins good. He glanced at Tim. “Have the Court of Owls been active lately?” He asked. Tim shrugged uncomfortably.

“Not according to any of our regular sources. Besides, why would they go after Steph?”

“I mean, _why not?”_ Steph groaned.

“And you don’t remember anything?” Bruce continued. Stephanie shook her head tiredly.

“No. But when I woke up, my clothes were torn,” she gulped, eyes sliding to the air over his shoulder. “I have bruises in weird places, and I have a throbbing headache. Like someone took a jackhammer to my head,” Jason huffed. “Alfred is taking some tests now,” and they all knew what kind of tests Alfred would want taken. Bruce’s hands clenched at his sides.

“Where was the basement?”

“Crime Alley,” Jason replied, speaking for the first time since Bruce had arrived. “She called Replacement, and he called me,” Bruce tried to hide his surprise that Tim even had Jason’s number, or felt comfortable enough to call on him. “I found her on 184th St, where a lot of the pimps hang out. She was alone. No sign of blood or struggle. She wasn’t even tied up or anything, just… Lying there,” his voice steeled over.

“According to my calculations, she was taken from campus at around 11:30 this morning, was gone for at least five hours. No idea what happened in the intervening time,” Tim’s eyes darted to Stephanie, who was fiddling insistently with a frayed edge of her blanket, eyes far-away. Bruce exhaled a slow breath, and, unsure, walked over to squeeze her hand.

“Whatever happens,” he promised, when she looked up. There were tears sparkling in her eyes. “We will find answers,” it was all he could give in terms of comfort. Stephanie gave a single nod, but she didn’t snatch her hand away. Bruce counted it as a win.

Damian cleared his throat. “Grayson is calling,” he announced. He rummaged about in his pocket for a moment, brows pinched, and flipped out his phone as he tapped the screen. “You are on speaker, Grayson.”

“Steph there?” Dick asked. In the background, Bruce could hear the wind whistling.

“Yes.”

“How you doin, Steph?” Dick asked.

“I feel like a million bucks, Dickie,” she replied, softly.

“You look like it, too,” Dick quipped. It brought a small smile to Steph’s face. “Cas and I finished investigating the basement where Jay found you,” Bruce smiled. It wasn’t often he was the last one to know things.

He had spent decades training each of these children, and he never could have predicted what extraordinary people they would become. “Find anything?” Tim asked.

“Nothing. You’re right, Jay. Whoever kidnapped Steph didn’t even leave a footprint or hair follicle for us to grab. We did find bloodstained rope. Sent it to Oracle and confirmed its from you Steph. Apparently, you fought back at some point, so they had to restrain you.”

“No…” Stephanie’s voice quivered, and Bruce squeezed her hand tighter. “No semen?”

“No,” that was Cassandra, her voice low and soothing. “I double checked.”

“Miss Stephanie,” Alfred announced, striding into the room. He stopped when he saw the phone. “Anything?”

“Nothing,” Damian reported, sounding put off by his own statement, as if it were a personal affront. “What about you?”

Alfred’s smile of relief loosened a knot Bruce hadn’t known grew in his chest. “Well, Miss Stephanie, you have a mild concussion and some bruises, but nothing more.”

Stephanie exhaled slowly. “So, they didn’t…?”

“Not that I can find, and I was very thorough, rest assured,” Alfred smiled, gently. “There aren’t even toxins in your system.”

“Then how’d they knock me out?”

“I believe that is the origin of your concussion. A hardy blow to the head, plus a few knocks.”

“Bastards,” Jason growled.

Stephanie fell into her pillows with a gasp of relief. Tim settled his forehead against her shoulder, laughing quietly. “Good. I was not ready to give up another child,” she breathed.

_You and me both,_ Bruce thought. “I still want to know who managed to kidnap you in broad daylight,” Jason continued. “And who the hell attacked Damian’s school, and still had the stockpile of a small army.”

“Weird coincidence, isn’t it?” Tim mused. “Wait, Steph…” He turned. “Ok, this is going to be a weird question and I promise I’ll explain, but where are your bruises?”

Stephanie stared at him for a moment, seemingly searching for something in his face, before releasing Bruce’s hand to push her shirt down to show her chest, mottled with vibrant yellow, black and blue bruises. His fists clenched.

“Er… Kinda everywhere? On my collarbone. My legs and ribs. Hence why I was so freaked out,” Tim nodded and scrubbed a hand down his face thoughtfully.

“Interesting,” he murmured.

Damian shifted weight, squinted at Steph’s bruises as if searching for the hidden metaphor. “Would you mind filling the rest of us in here, replacement?” Jason demanded, impatiently. “What the fuck is so interesting?”

“Don’t you see it?” Tim looked up; eyes wide with surprise. Bruce smiled and exchanged a fond glance with Alfred. He had said it before, but he stood by it once more. Tim was going to be the greatest of them all one day. “Her bruises. Even on her chest, I can see the pattern.”

“What?” Steph squawked. She stared at her chest; mouth agape.

“It’s braille,” Bruce filled in.

“You mean someone wrote a note on me using _bruising_?” Steph sounded insulted. “What am I, a sticky note?”

“What’s it say, Tim?” Dick wondered.

“I can’t get a read without the full bruises. I’ll, er, have you draw me a diagram later,” Tim said, with a semi-panicked look as Steph started unbuttoning her blouse. She continued, unperturbed by his awkwardness as she glared at the dark spots dotting her upper torso. “But it could be like the victims of Damian’s school. Probably a threat of some kind, which just proves my theory,” when he raised his eyes, they were dark with foreboding.

“Which is?” Alfred pressed; eyebrows furrowed. Bruce exhaled a harsh breath. He had a feeling he knew what Tim was about to say, and it made his heart skip a beat.

“This is the same person,” Tim said, with perfect confidence. “And they’re targeting _us_ specifically.”


End file.
